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UNITED STATES OF AMERICA t 



The Fallen 



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THE^ POEyVlS 



BY JAMES B. KENYON 




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UTICA, N. Y.: 

CURTISS & CHILDS, PUBLISHERS, 

1876. 



toF* 



Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1876, by 
JAMES B. KENYON, 

In the office of the Librarian ot Congress, at Washington. 



CCTRTISS & ClIILPS, PRINTERS, 

107 Genesee St. 



CONTENTS. 

Proem, ........ 7 

The Fallen, . . . . ... 9 

Isabel, 24 

Forgiveness, ...... 25 

The Reconciliation. ..... 27 

Black Eyes, ...... 29 

Blue Eyes, . ... . 31 

Cassandra, ....... 33 

Sorrow, 39 

The City of the Dead, .... 40 
Morning, . . ... -54 

Lillie Day, 56 

My Clare, . . " . . . .66 

To Etta, 67 

When I Die, .69 

Retraction, . . . . . . 72 

The Poet's Inheritance, . 75 

The Present, ....:. 79 

A Song of Sympathy, . . . . .81 

Allie Moore, . . . . 119 

A Tribute, . 154 

Disappointment, ...... 157 

The Old Story, 158 

Pro Memoria, ...... 160 

The Meetine. 162 



CONTENTS. 

Confession, 165 

An Autumn Scene, . , . . 166 

To the Atheist, 169 

Washington's Birthday, ..... 176 

The Coming Day, . . . , 180 

Denial, 186 

Milton, 187 

The Roseleaf, . . . . 190 

By the Corse of a Friend, . . . 191 

A Memorial, . . . ■ . . . 195 

A Love Song, 198 

Epithalmium, ....... 201 

A Moonlight Reverie, . . . 204 

Katie Leigh, ....... 211 

The Bud, 217 

To a Brook, . 219 

Aphony, 221 

Disquiet, ........ 226 

The Leaf, . . . . . 229 

Unrest, 236 

Evolution, 238 

Song 249 

To Erato, . . . . . . 251 

Waiting, . . . . . . . .253 

A Dedication, ...... 255 

Hymn for Christmas Eve, .... 257 

Christmas Morn, ...... 262 

With Humble Hearts and Fervent Prayers, 263 



CONTENTS, 

Self - Reliance, ...... 264 

To Father Henry, , 267 

Anti - Bacchus, ...... 272 

Beulah, 276 

Three Sonnets on a Winter's Eve, . . 278 

La Verge a la Chaise, ..... 281 

To a Sleeping Child, .... 283 

Sonnet, ........ 284 

The Angel of Night, . . . ... 285 

1S76, • 286 



5 



PROEM. 

Go, little "book, in hopes and fears bedight, 
First offering of my sad and sunny hours; 
As sweetest, sometimes, are the humblest flowers, 

So thou may'st yield, perchance, a small delight. 

The powers whereby we did essay our flight 
As yet are youthful, but will grow with years : 
Like Icarus, o'ercome with sudden fears, 

We have not ventured a too lofty height, 

And so fall'n, broken - wing'd, from dizzy- skies. 
Go ! tho' 'mid statelier bards that pipe around 

Men scarce will hear thee, since thy melodies 
Are very simple; yet thy fragile sound 

May wake to music in some heart a chord, 

Which stronger touch than thine had only jarr'd. 



THE FALLEN. 

Keep clean, bear fruit, earn life, and watch 
Till the white-winged reapers come. 

Henry Vaiighan. 

"Ay, fallen ! fallen ! wherefore should I weep 

That now, with scorn, men pass me coldly by, 

Who were destroyers of my primal worth, 

And sweeter chastity, that which alone 

Accords true happiness upon the earth, 

And builds a hope for that far world to be ? 

Are not we all the creatures of one God ? 

Have we not sinn'd together ? Who, then, shall say 

Wherein their sin is lighter than my own ? 

Who will assert they bear a whiter robe, 

A cleaner page, a purer life, than I, 

That knowing all the weakness of our race 

They make it but a vantage-ground to lust, 

To feed and vivify a lecherous love ? 



10 THE FALLEN. 

Oh, that I were again a spotless child 

To humbly kneel once more at mother's knee! 

Or, knowing all the forecast of the years, 

I might retrieve a life so wholly lost, 

And in an earnest, fruitful penance blot 

The awful record of a shameful life. 

I might receive, then, that sweet peace of heart — 

That calm of soul that tells us we are blest, 

But which I'm fallen too low to ask for now. 

A wide, wide world, and a metropolis, 

And men and women of one cdrnmon will — 

One great strong purpose, and one mind to crush 

The feeble low, to life's most bitter lees. 

Yet am I still a sister unto all, 

And like to them in wants and little griefs, 

And that which renders joy and which annoys : 

For from the dust together have we sprung, 

And back to dust we shall return again 

And mingle, a confused and mighty mass. 

Who reached thro' my dark storm of poverty 

A hand I would have kissed to prop me up, 

And buoy my sinking heart above the tide 



TEE FALLEX. 



Of dark disgrace, and worse — contumely ? 

I fell — and habit with such cautious pace, 

And visage hidden 'neath the fairest mask, 

Steals silently upon us till it saps 

The purest living founts of moral strength ! 

What ! shall we speak for others, ay or ay, 

And wish them larger happiness in store, 

Who would not reach a finger in their pride 

To succor one from their foul slough of sin, 

Lest they contaminate its daintiness ? 

Am I not one with them in this great world, 

Commensurate of passions and desires, 

And like them with no largess of strong will ? 

Ah God ! the oppression of the poor to - day, 

And the mock - royalty wherein lite men 

And wanting sense bow down and smirk to wealth, 

Give vague foreshadowings of a dark to-come. 

We all are weak and erring in our lives, 

And where is there a mortal free from sin ? 

Ay, where ? — not one ; for all have sometime tript, 

And though they have not, haply, fallen quite, 

Mine has, perchance, but been a harsher fate — 



1 2 THE FALLEN. 

Tho' in my heart are lingering seeds of good : — 

Wherefore shall others, then, say I am pure 

And holy far above another one? 

Tho' I have wrong'd my God, and wrong'd myself, 

Shall men as weak and full of crime as I 

Presume to be accusers and my judge? 

O Heaven above me ! if there reign a God, 

Shall He not measure justice unto them 

As they do mete it, scarce and sparingly ? 

But is there justice on the whole broad earth 

But that is elbow'd into narrow space 

By rancorous minds and threefold narrower, 

Till poltroon man takes little thankfully, 

And with content nor looks nor asks for more ? 

And man — base in grate ! — in propitious hours 

Contemns, or doth ignore the source benign 

Whence come all blessings, till an adverse fate 

Rolls back the tidal wave of his success, 

When, shorn of other hope, he blandly comes 

With maudlin tears unto the altar - stairs, 

And lays him penitently at Christ's feet. 

But why should I inveigh against the age, 



IHE'FALLEX. 1 3 

Wherein was wrought the universal scale 
That counterpoises right with wrong disguised, 
And gives to falsehood equal weight with truth ? 
When the whole world will slumber in deep sloth, 
Nor take up arms to banish wrong from earth, 
Or in an apathy see, yet not move. 
Alas! that we, the latter heirs of time, 
Should so immure ourselves within ourselves, 
Where, groping blindly, lost to wider realms, 
We, self-deluded, move within the sphere 
Encompassed by the limits of this life, 
And measure by our own capacities 
All things, so knowing naught of higher things, 
Lose all the outer world, and — simply live, 
No more ; or in high flattery of self 
With purest morals, close life's little day. 
But doctrines, ethics, creeds of men are null, 
When in this life's probation they prove false ; 
Tho' now with use all things do grow corrupt. 
Life is not of such poor account that we, 
Neglecting self in such high scrutiny, 
Should play dictator, or the meaner spy 



14 THE FALLEN. 

On other's acts, with purport to conform 

Their actions and their lives unto one rule — 

One law laid down and narrowed by ourselves 

Into the compass of our own vile acts : 

For God who ruleth with a sweeter law, 

In generous concert with His will divine, 

Hath shaped our courses unto different ends, 

That, in His own good time, we may fulfill 

Our being's ordinance and wise decrees. 

Prerogatives of Kings, in natural state, 

Are such as to the common mass belong, 

Nor are they higher in immunities, 

Except in such things as themselves build up; 

Tho' men thro' fear, and want of self-respect 

Sufficient to o'ercome a brassy will, 

In silence acquiesce, fall down, and worship. 

So in the lesser walks of civic life, 

Or in the social zones wherein men move, 

N ot one can lay hereditary claim — 

Beyond what nature doth concede to all — 

To power whereby men claim a vaster range 

In privilege, and the exercise of will, 



TEE FALLEN. 1 5 

To scrutinize a life, or to didtate 

The course wherein a fellow man shall move ; 

And thro' a temporal advantage gain'd 

In matters irrelative to that rich life, 

Which is an heirdom unto all pure men, 

Not one may doom his brother to the rack 

Of spirit-pangs to glut a carnal lust, 

Or, thro' fierce clamors of the corporal being, 

In poverty and wretched indigence, 

Place him in bondage unto sin and crime. 

I knew not how to wield the sweaty tool, 

Such as supplies, by honest labor, bread, 

And clothes the naked limbs of Poverty ; 

So fell — for may not simple circumstance 

Give color to the future of a life, 

Warp all that which is goodly in the soul, 

And dwarf the growing mind in its expanse ? 

Ah ! sin doth cast upon the soul a blight, 

As when, not knowing, sadness on the heart 

Doth steal, or when at noon-day shadows creep 

O'er upland lawns, and valley-meadows, grove 

And stream, drinking the sunshine as they go, 



1 6 THE FALLEN. 

And leaving their dark footsteps upon all. 

The crescent glow of ripening intellect, 

And that procreant genius in mankind, 

Are smothered by the stifling breath of want, 

And die by the cold touch of penury; 

It cramps affections into narrow spheres, 

Breeding within us thoughts of evil kind, 

And is the father of a thousand crimes ; 

It unto us makes known our littleness, 

Feeding the lower appetites of all, 

Arid levels us by our desires with brutes; 

It nips that which is noblest in mankind, 

And with the gyves of meanness clasps him round, 

Till he becomes a stranger to himself. 

We all do live a double life — a life 

Within ourselves, and one of outward show; 

But ignorance conculcates chastity, 

And when I strove in secret to reform, 

That iron foot, yclept " society," 

Has ground me deeper in the loathsome mire 

From which I fain would rise forever, and 

Discouragement has settled on my heart, 



THE FALLEN. 1 7 

And nevermore shall raise its dusky wings, 

Until each throbbing pulse has ceased to beat. 

We all are compeers in this petty world, 

And each has a full complement of good 

By law of nature, but the grasping hand 

Has robb'd the orphan of her scanty dole, 

And avarice has piled its coffers full. 

Ah God ! how selfish are we in this world ! 

How men tread down their brothers to the dust, 

And press a poisonous ichor into wounds 

Already bleeding thro' such unkind blows, 

And cankered to the very core of life ! 

How rarely doth white winged Charity 

Find place within the hearts of mortals here, 

Or find a green isle in this desert sea 

Of heat, and haste, and strife in self-concern. 

Oh! woman has perverted her best powers, 

And turned aside that high and noble grace — ■ 

That chastity that made her lovable, 

And stately in a touch of Paradise. 

For woman is the summit of God's work — 

The diadem of all humanity — . 



1 8 THE FALLEN. 

Creation's fairest evidence of Christ, 

And in her perfe6t flower of womanhood 

Has such a share of Heaven's divinity, 

That she is more of angel than of earth. 

But coarser natures, thro' a sensual haze, 

And passion - blinded, see not thro' the mirk 

How dainty is the fabric whence her life 

Is wrought, but rudely tear it down and tramp 

It deep into the mire and filth of lust, 

Then fling it so distained forever by. 

Her nature is her own — not like to man's — 

And in her own domain is regaller 

Than sceptered King or Queen; but she steps out 

Beyond the limit Christ has circumscribed, 

And, folly-girt, breathes a rank atmosphere 

Till she herself becomes impure, when robb'd 

Of all that made her truly beautiful — 

The sacred pearl whereby men mete her worth — 

Sinks lower from the very height she fell. 

Oh! woman in her sphere is blest to man; 

For she hath been created to one lot, 

That in itself is Christlier than all 






THE FALLEN. 19 

She moves in beauty in her native place, 

Environ'd by the higher things of life, 

Surrounded by all good, and in herself 

She is the purer portion of the world. 

None may discharge her duties but herself, 

For her ways are the sweeter, and she walks 

Within her world of empire crowned Queen, 

And set to tasks that mould the character 

Of microcosm, and the mass of earth. 

But let the world go on ! till in the run 

Of years she shall return to whence she passed, 

And know the circuit where she moves in life 

Is holier than all others, that her mission 

Is not alone to multiply mankind, 

Or in her travail reproduce the world, 

But that she is the chosen minister 

Of good, a mediator 'twixt Christ and us, 

And, thro' the high ensample set to man, 

In her fair being and her purer life, 

To battle with the Titan sins of earth, 

And put down all the evils of this life. 

To-day within the city's morgue I stood, 



16 THE FALLEN. 

And in that ghastly charnel room I wept; 

For, gazing on that care-worn brow, the pinched 

And wasted countenance of him who in 

My maiden innocence first taught me shame, 

I thought of ancient days of happy love 

When, trustful as a child, I knew no wrong, 

And for futurity bore sweetest hopes. 

Then, too, with perfect trust in manly pride, 

I lent a shy, reluctant ear to words 

That glow'd with love in passionate promises,— 

He nipt the pure white blossom of my faith, 

And wreck'd my future and the life to come. 

Yet him I have forgiven ; Father, thou 

Wilt then make clean my life's soil'd register, 

Create anew the spirit in my breast, 

Forget my recreant footsteps, and thro' the 

Great love Thou bear'st me make me wholly Thine. 

Thou knowest us, and yet we know not Thee, 

But only catch dim sense of what Thou art; 

Yet we do know that mercy is in Thee, 

From everlasting ev'n unto the end, 

Blent with a love so vast that we can here 



THE FALLEN. 21 

Find no similitude in earth's best love. 

And I have taken a Hell ward trend from Thee, 

Till now I upward turn my fainting gaze, 

Praying that Thou wilt shrive me of my sins, 

And, tho' men spurn, receive with Love's wide arms. 

What tho' in life I've only known of grief? 

My God ! thou art to me far kindlier 

Than man, and I have known no nearer friend : 

For equally to Thee we all are dear, 

As souls, and Thou wilt hear me when I come, 

As readily as one of soilure less, 

That cometh penitently unto Thee, 

And with meek spirit, knowing of its sin. 

Nor come I suing unto Thee within 

The shallow limits of the brain, with pray'r 

Drest tawdrily, to please the ear alone, 

But with soul comprehensive of Thy vast 

Omnipotence, nll'd with Thy majesty, 

And going out thro' an infinitude " 

Of space to reach Thee with a pray'r, not cast 

Hopeless as waifs upon an ocean waste, 

But gladly, knowing Thou wilt answer me, 



2 2 ' ?HE FALLEtf. 

So listen unto me — Thy fallen child; 
Bend low, O God — Thou know'st how low I am; 
Bend low, my Father, list the lost one's cry, 
The loath'd of man — tho' offspring of Thy hand, 
That cometh tearful, and with humble heart, 
Taught by distress, Thou knowest but how deep/' 



'Twas dusk ; and on the gray cathedral steps, 

Thro' the dim light, was seen a kneeling form. 

The pale dawn broke, and in the East the sun 

Rose like a flame and flung its earliest ray 

Athwart the angel carven on the dome, 

And broke and played in thousand ruby hues 

Across the winter snow upon the roof; 

Then slowly crept adown the marble shaft, 

And o'er the pallid form within the drift 

It lingered gently as a mother's kiss 

Upon the soft lips of her slumbering boy : 

Slight, frail, fair-haired, with meek thin lips, and pale 

Sweet face, tho' faded, beautiful in death. 

" One of the lost," the watchman said, "only 



THE FALLEN. 2$ 

A tenant for the morgue." Two morns had past, 
And in the narrow rows of Potter's field, 
Amid the long stretch of those tombless swells, 
Was there a nameless, shallow, new-made grave. 
O God, Most High, protect thy fallen ones ! 



24 ISABEL. 



ISABEL. 

When roses fairest bloom in Spring, 

And on the brook the blossom floats, 
When, ere the robin takes the wing, 

Pours forth his sweetest notes, 
I miss thee in the ancient haunt, 

Where long ago we loved to dwell — 
Where tall and white the lilies flaunt 

I plucked for thee, sweet Isabel. 

But when the northern winds blow cool, 

And white the moon gleams o'er the mere, 
I linger by the silent pool, 

And drop thee there a tear; 
Or when behind the sobbing pines 

The moon looks low o'er hill and fell, 
Kneel where the river inward winds, 

And pray for thee, my Isabel, 



FORGIVENESS. 25 



FORGIVENESS. 

Oh deep the pain of kin to those who go 

Shame-branded and forlorn upon the earth ; 
But deeper, keener in the heart that woe, 

When she who sinn'd was she who gave you birth ! 
The power of passion o'er a feeble will 

None can compute, save who have felt the stain 
And ignominy that will rise and fill 

The heart that sues in penance all in vain. 

How desert is the heart of charity 

When the poor victim on whom falls the blow 
Is neither near nor dear, but the heart free 

From pangs, such as, in those who share and know 
How deep is the disgrace and misery, 

O'erwhelm with grief more than the soul can bear, 
Withholds all kindness, nor one little plea 

Will urge to save the erring from dispair. 



2 6 FORGIVENESS. 

But in the flesh — and of that flesh mine own — 

Hath sinn'd the being on whose tender breast 
I lay and throve in love, and love alone 

To me thro' life of her was doubly blest. 
And I have felt those passions, not in name, 

Storm with mad fury, unto which she gave 
Her own sweet chastity and virgin fame, 

For a dark blot hid only by the grave. 

Ah ! then shall I as weak spurn that dear form 

That gave me life, and nurtured me in love? 
Thine, hers, and mine death, ashes, and the worm; 

And Christ alone may cancel sins above. 
Come, thou poor outcast ! come, oh mother mine ! 

Sinn'd hast thou — by sin all may be beguiled; 
As the world scorns, nearer shall our hearts entwine, 

Thou art my mother still, and I thy child. 



THE BE CONCILIA TION. 2 7 



THE RECONCILIATION. 

Emma and I fell out, one day — 

Fell out, yet knew not why, 
And when we met, upon the way, 

With nods passed coldly by. 
Those summer days into Autumn's haze 

Passed, veiled in pale blue guise, 
And when the trees to crimson blaze 

Were touched with autumn dyes 
We met again, and still with pain 

We passed each other by — 
Try as I would, I tried in vain — 

She heard me gently sigh. 
She dropped her glove — a tiny glove — 

Upon the yellow path ; 
Sly Cupid whispered, " If you love 

Return, forget your wrath." 



2 8 THE BE CON CILIA TWIST. 

I took the little arbiter, 

Returned it bland and mild, — 
She only said, "Ah! thank you, sir," 

But, bowing, sweetly smiled. 
" Come, Emma," said I, " let us cease, 

An age of love we've missed :" 
And she, "Will, I have wanted peace 

This long time " — and we kissed. 






BLACK EYES. 



BLACK EYES. 

Hadst thou lived in days of old, 

O what wonders had been told 

Of thy lively countenance, 

And thy humid eyes that dance, 

In the midst of their own brightness, 

In the very fane of lightness. 

Keats. 

With black eyes wherefore rend my heart, 
When I would gladly give it thee ? 
A tyrant, thou, for thou canst see 
How it flutters at a glance, 
As before a keen-edg'd lance 
The craven quails. It doth start, 
Not knowing wherefore, at a look 
Full orb'd and bright ; then as forsook - 
As nestlings by the parent left to die 
Sink, with a fainter, fainter growing cry, 



30 BLACK EYES. 

To death — so when thou from my heart thy flashes 

Dost take, and veil them by the down dropt lashes. 

Sleep laden, for a moment cometh peace. 

E'en as the fettered soul feels death release, 

But all in vain, 

For at a glance of thine 'tis chain'd again 






BLUE EYtfS. 31 



BLUE EYES. 

Summer skies with those blue eyes 

Can never match ; , 

Within their depths a sunbeam lies, 

And they do catch 
A grace from beauty's light. 
More sweetly, radiantly bright 

Than a dead glow shines something there — 
A soul — and innocently white 

And pure makes them thrice fair. 
And yet a something on this earth we prize, 

A gift bestowed of Heaven, and that makes 
Them in the jealous, scanning eyes of man 

Of duplicate enhancement, since it wakes 
Respect with admiration, is what lies 

Within that which the w r orld calls modesty, 
And which in them, not fictive, is their own. 

In them is innocence no forelaid plan, 



3 2 ft WE EYES. 

And poorly executed, but the will 
Divine of secret nature to fulfill 

Its laws, perfecting them where they should be, 
In that there are no sweeter things to see, 
And that in heaven stars brighter have not 
shone ; 
It is befitting self unto its sphere, 

And in themselves clothe self thrice charmingly. 

In those blue eyes alone 
Doth beauty find her subtlest art, 
For mirrored in them, deep and clear, 
Is there a gentle heart. 






CASSANDRA. $7> 



CASSANDRA. 

O palsied multitude of purblind men ! 

feeble sucklings of the latter age 1 

Ere ye had doubted the prophetic voice — 
The Augurs' voice — the voice infallible — - 
Better ye had been brought forth without ears 
And tongueless (for the mute may not revile), 
Or ye had never known of prophecy, 
And what fore warnings oracles may give. 
Tho' from those heights where old Deucalion 
Himself had from the general deluge saved 

1 have not caught Dodonian whisperings, 

Nor wisdom's muffled voice thro' oaken leaves, 

Yet am I come knowing whereof I speak ; 

Nor have I from the clear Castalius Fons, 

That gushes sweetly from Parnassus' heart, 

Drunk inspiration, nor from laurel boughs 

Have shook the leaves wherewith to crown myself; 

Neither have I from Delphi's hollow grot 

B 



34 CASSANDRA. 

Breathed sudden frenzy, nor have blown the foam 

From quivering lips, beat breast, nor torn my hair, 

Nor spake mysterious incoherent words, 

Nor vague responses from the tripod caught. 

But clear and bold has been my tongue to ye ; 

For when upon that memorable time 

Night gathered power and fell and day was quenched, 

Within the temple of Apollo lay 

Two rosy forms of childhood rapt in sleep. 

And who shall say what visions then were their's, 

What gifts the God brought down, what life was 

breath'd 
Thro' all their veins with largess of new powers, 
That held the mind and strode beyond the years, 
And fetched a knowledge of the far To - be ? 
But when the morning mists rose from the fields, 
Lazily drawing to that far - off sea, 
That rolls a sombre breaker to the strand, 
And dawn crept down from off the snow - capt hills 
From law r n to lawn, and ledge to ragged ledge, 
And stole thro' all the valley to the west, 
They sought the shrine and lo ! the boy and girl 



CAStiAXBBA. 35 

Slept on a couch of laurel leaves unharmed, 

Tho' at their sides two serpents lickt their ears. 

From thence to them the syllables of the Gods 

Were ever audible, and from above 

The blue Olympus came thro' all the air, 

O'er mountain peaks and the Granicus' flood, 

In stately council, voices from on high. 

But what of this ? all this ye know, for time 

And time upon the flying heels of time, 

Ye 've heard it told again and yet again. 

Ho ! bring me from your midst your whitest - haired, 

Bring out your aged, wrinkled, toothless crones, 

Fetch here those whom most winters most have 

marr'd, 
Or summer suns have mellow'd over - ripe, 
They shall attest this truth what I have uttered. 
Ye deem me mad : ay, that I be to see 
Ye cavil in slight bickerings with the Gods, 
And fillip ribald jests at high decrees. 
Wherefore have care ! I tell ye coming years 
Shall see ye, could it save from alien hands 
Your happy homes, bow'd in humility 



36 CASSANDRA. 

Unto the dust, and willing in your minds 

To gnaw out your own tongues that they did speak 

The recreant words that sold ye unto woe, 

And wrought for ye such dire calamities. 

I say, have care, O Trojans have a care ! 

Ev'n now I see past Troy's great walls and towers 

Th' embattled hosts stretch over all the plain, 

And myriad sails above the sounding sea 

Move like a mighty billow to the beach. 

And lo ! thro' cunning and the wooden horse, 

Sad Pallas weeps above her fallen city, 

And at its gates red - handed slaughter howls 

And beats an adit. Behold ! at midday stalks 

Wan Atropos thro' the markets and the squares, 

And games have ceased and revelry has died, 

And pale Dispair sits mutely at your doors 

With claspt and nerveless hands and blood-shot eyes. 

There are not hands amid the living found 

Sufficient to incinerate the dead, 

And our fair temples turn to hospitals, 

While from the brazen dome of heaven the sun 

Hurls his fierce glare down on the rotting corse; 



CASSANDRA. 37 

And all the sick air reels with horrid stench, 
And urns are glutted with the dust of friends. 
Queen Hecuba's dream yet shall be fulfilled; 
For from the hills, among his browsing herds, 
Down strides he of the shining yellow hair, 
Fair Paris, who with his dread brand of beauty 
Shall make your homes an awful holocaust. 

ravished lovely Pallas ! O the ruin 
For foul adultery thro' beauty wrought ! 

1 hear the dust of our gray father Tros, 
In hollow thunders mixt with wailing cries, 
And sounds of noiseful arms in battle doom, 
Come gathering from the grave and round the night 
Go wandering with the clash of armament, 

Mid fitful gleams of War's red torch on high, 

Thro' rolling clouds of smoke and spark - lit gloom 

Mounting from off a Nation's funereal pyre. 

Beyond the blue Propontis' golden beach, 

And o'er the eddying tide of Simois, 

Thro' Taurian ranges, mid the broken sweep 

Of weeping hills, the sobbing echoes flee 

On hollow winds with stalwart warrior's groans, 

And tender infant cries, and the shrill shrieks 



38 CASSANDRA. 

Of women mid the fragments of their homes. 

No more the shepherd pipes on Ida's slopes 

To peaceful herds amid the morning flowers, 

Nor hang the dewy meadows o'er the steeps 

In quiet vales, and haunts of Oreads, 

And nymphs, and hamadryads, in the crash 

Of war have vanished in the common waste. 

I say have care ! O, desolation whirls 

O'er citadel, and column'd crown and tower, 

And all melt off and crumble at a breath, 

While your thin dust is blown about in wind, 

O'er all the Euxine and the ^Egean wastes, 

From horns of Tritons o'er the middle sea. 

And round the deep to farthest isles is borne 

A cry of lamentation thro' the east, 

The dirge of fallen Ilium, drown'd in paeans 

Triumphal from those who recross the main, 

Flusht with the spoils of plunder. Have a care, 

O have a care ! For yonder in the East, 

Aurora leaps from gray old Tithon's lap 

Flusht rosily, within her arms young Sol, 

And surely as she cometh o'er the snows 

That crown Pedasean mountains, Troy shall fall ! 



sorrow. 39 



SORROW. 

The varied seasons roll away, 

Rolling onward with the varied years; 

Light and shadow fill out life's brief day, 
Gloom and sunshine, smiles and tears. 

O heart, 'twere better thus; let grief be grief; 

Let cloud or sunray fleck the froward path : 
In rain and shine grew ripe the bearded sheaf; 

Love gathers in love's sweeter aftermath. 

Be glad, O heart, life is not always bright, 
Be glad thy sky is not forever fair; 

The day is dearer for the gloom of night : 
God puts not on us more than we can bear. 



40 THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 

Vive memor lethi. 

O'er yonder fane fast crumbling to decay 

The moss and vine have spread their mantles 
green ; 

Each falling stone, and tottering pillar gray, 
In shattered splendor grace the ruin'd scene. 

Tearfully turned on the great gray heart within, 
Seeing dimly like an old man's fading eyes, 

Each window seems recalling what hath been, 
As, one by one, the shadowy trains arise. 

There rests a wanness over all forlorn; 

Time's fingers passing o'er have left a stain; 
Still like a weary sentinel, overworn, 

The tall spire stands and antique weather - vane. 

As aged and as bow'd, o'er each low wall, 
Sighing sweet benisons upon the air, 



TEE CITY OF THE DEAD. 41 

Still watching and still weeping over all, 

The elm spreads silent hands of blessing there. 

The swallow wheeling near the lowly eaves, 
The cricket chirping 'neath the damp flagstone, 

Awake the stillness round; but rude man leaves, 
In solitary grandeur, this alone. 

Not always thus — but in an earlier date, 

A scene of warring breast — of struggling heart 

To free from sin, and then a harsher fate 

When eager thousands throng'd its daily mart. 

Now desolate, such destiny fulfilled, 

Allotted by mankind, deserted now 
By him, homes unmolested swallows build 

Where once in worship he was wont to bow. 

Ah yes, upon the peaceful Sabbath tide, 

From over hills, thro' meadows vernal green, 

Each simple devotee devoutly hied, 

In homespun clad, and with an humble mien. 



42 THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 

Beside them rural maidens, fresh and fair, 
Its narrow aisle with step elastic trod; 

Or came the village maid with haughty air, 
Neophyte to latest Fashion, not to God. 

Oft in the mellow twilight, calm and sweet, 

When tinged with flame was every western cloud, 

Here prayer arose from both, in accents meet, 
The lowly heart, and prideful folly bow'd. 

With bitter tears, and hearts by conflict torn, 
Within these courts transformed a charnel.room, 

By loving friends, by kindred hands, was borne 
The corse before consignment to the tomb. 

Oh, walk with me where sleep the holy dead, 
Where quiet reigns, where peace and rest abide; 

Where tired mortals lay the weary head, 
And high and lowly slumber side by side. 

Beneath this modest stone a mother sleeps, 
And here a youth who once ambition knew, 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 43 

And yonder, where the tangled cypress weeps, 
A sister rests who died in beauty's hue. 

Here lies a tender maid in sweet repose, 
Not Fortune's child — -to Luxury unknown, 

Who early tasted all the cold world's woes, 
And rests in death, as life, obscure, alone. 

Kind Memory erects not here a tomb; 

Unknown beneath this mound a mortal sleeps ; 
Alas ! hope glow'd in youth, but died in gloom ; 

He toil'd for fame — -oblivion he reaps. 

A little grave! From tumult, strife and din, 
A darling babe rests where the shadows lie; 

It passed from earth soul - stainless, pure from sin, 
Ere clouds had overcast its morning sky. 

It is a gorgeous shaft ! who lies beneath, 
That pomp must even here a memoir keep ? 

Alas ! must vanity mark mortals ev'n in death, 
And gairishness the grave ? Well, let him sleep. 



44 tBe city of the dead. 

His fame was his, and his the pain of fame, 

For pain with fame must stamp the gilded brow ; 

He learned how hollow is a sounding name, 
And what its price. Be ours the moral rfow. 

Behold ! beside it is another mound, 

An humbler grave : ah, what a contrast here ! 

And yet their couch the same — but damp dark 
ground ; 
Their lots are equal; still, this won a tear, 

Tho' poor and lowly, wrung from friendship's eye, 
And honest sorrow from the lower breast. 

Death is a mighty leveler. Or high 

Or low, all have a common place of rest. 

But all this pomp of grief cannot redeem 
The dust beneath from dust or pale decay ; 

Across a common turf alike doth beam 

The same sweet sun, and breaks a common day. 

Th' unlikeness tho' is great, and men are weak, 
And glittering obje<5ts catch the human eye; 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 45 

And yet the very gaud of one more meek 

The other makes. But on, and pass them by. 

A father's grave ! ah, the sweet breath of love 
Shall ever fill the hearts of those who mourn 

His absence, and who fondly trust above 
To meet him, on the wings of faith upborne 

Unto the fuller glory of the skies, 

Whence he, with fond compassion looking down, 
Beholds the Christ - like patience to uprise 

Of hearts that struggle for the cross and crown. 

Ah, dark neglect ! are friends and friendship flown, 
And art thou to the world so soon forgot ? 

Must brush and brambles be thy name alone, 
Or hide from man of thy last sleep the spot ? 

Tho' mine an alien hand, yet shall it be 

To thee what others nearer should have been ; 

A stranger's hand shall clear thy grave, tho' thee 
Thy kindred should forget; their's is the sin. 



4-6 THE CITY OF THE I)EAt). 

Thus early friendships pass like mist away, 
Affrighted at a kiss of morning's sun ; 

And love on earth is mortal, but a day 
It liveth, passeth, and our youth is done. 

But stay ! I know that passing years have knolPd 
A mournful requiem o'er a soul at rest, 

That evermore loved on while seasons rolPd, 
Till gray the heart grew in the weary breast; 

Ay, loved on, and the winters came and went, 
While hopes like Autumn leaves fell in the round 

Of tireless years, till strength and trust were spent, 
Then sought her long rest in the dark cool ground. 

This world is bleak, and life is full of cares ; 

Nor is a friend a friend, save who in deed 
Proves himself such: we stand alone: and prayers — 

Naught else — avail to comfort us in need. 

Alas! alas! how unkind are our deeds 

Unto each other, and our lives — how brief! 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 47 

How kindred hands press in old wounds the seeds 
Of a slow venom, and at such a grief 

As wrings the heart with anguish nod and smile 
Remorseless, till death stills the troubled heart; 

Ev'n then o'er closing graves will tongues revile, 
And slander, plumed and pennon'd, wing its dart. 

Ay, ere the dust be cold, or the grave green, 
Our memories are poison'd, nor the tomb 

Holds of respect a share, but what hath been 
Within the darkness smoulders to relume 

At the strong breath of envy or of hate; 

Ah! even in the grave we have no rest 
If fortune was life's meed, or fickle Fate 

Smiled on us at reluctant Fame's behest. 

O sleep, sweet sleep, how to thy soft embrace 
Fly weary mortals from the world's great roar 

To hide awhile the wan and anxious face, 

And close their eyes upon life's fevered shore. 



48 THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 

But death, O softer, sweeter are thy charms; 

Thou wilt not be unkind ev'n for a day; 
No more we waken to life's rude alarms, 

Nor giv'st thou for a moment, but for aye. 

O, we are thine lapt in the bliss of rest ; 

Cool dust, not burning tears, upon our eyes ; 
O, we are thine, safe in thy sheltering breast. 

Till thou shalt yield us when God bid us rise. 

And in thy care we lay our dear ones by, 
Yet still we cannot bear to see them go, 

But call to them in love and fondly cry, 

Tho' thou wilt lead them safely on we know. 

Ay, how we strive, as they go out forever. 

To call them back, and grasp the cold moist hand, 

As tho' to check the soul, too near the river 
To catch an echo from this far-off land. 

Ah, thro' this silent City of the Dead, 
With soul subdued, I reverently pass, 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 49 

Nor break the stillness by a careless tread, 
Nor ruffle on a grave a blade of grass. 

The world hath husht the throbbing of its breast ; 

A rifted glory breaks across the day, 
And hovers, halo - like, o'er each white crest, 

Where rise the purple mountains far away. 

An hour for meditation and for prayer! 

Kneel, sinner, kneel and lift your heart in love; 
The very quiet round, and the still air, 

In silent worship breathe of Him above. 

Kneel, sinner, kneel, profane not God's best hour ; 

The birds are dumb and mutely praise Him now; 
Kneel, 'tis the time God shall evince His power; 

O mortal, teach thy stubborn heart to bowv 

A sound of sabbath bells upon the air, 

A hearse, a train of mourners, and a song; 

O mournful sight! and was she young and fair? 
But still the dark procession moves along, 



SO THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 

And still the bell tolls with a muffled knell; 

O giant heart that beats the years away! 
And such forever is the round ; 'tis well ; 

A life, a death, a night, and then a day. 

And so doth perish that which is sublime, 

And every noiseless wheel is clogged with rust; 

A voice sweeps down the corridors of time, 
"Ashes to ashes, unto dust its dust. 

Give back to earth that which from earth hath sprung, 
And to the worm give up its rightful food; 

Thy days are numbered, and thy life hath hung 
Upon its golden cord but for the good 

Which it might render to thy fellow men, 

And likewise to thy God. Thy tasks are done, 

And back to earth thou shalt return again, 
For there shall be a higher life begun." 

Yes, all must die, such is the common lot, 
We must return our life to Him who gave; 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 5 I 

Tho 1 some remembered sleep, yet more forgot, 
The rich and poor alike must seek the grave. 

And now when I recall that one dark hour, 

When that dull weight sank down upon my mind, 

When past the reach of all save one high power, 
I weep with and I feel for all mankind. 

I saw them carry out the little form, 

O God ! our household's beauty and its light, 

Out, out forever; then down to the worm, 
Down into darkness, into all the night 

That wraps the grave I saw them lay our child, 
And heard the clods fall on the little heart, 

So still, so silent, that once beat so wild 

With sweet child -joy. Ah Christ, the tears will 
start, 

Although I know, my Father, it is well, 

Since now she dwells beyond the reach of pain, 

And every earthly ill. Yet none can tell, 

Save parents, how the wound will bleed again, 



52 THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 

When memory recalls the dear delight, 

Each word, each spot our darling used to kndw, 

Be still, my heart ! far, far beyond your sight 
Your idol dwells above the voice of woe. 

And looking back thro' reconciling years, 
I see 'twere better that it thus should he; 

For whither thou hast journeyed are no tears, 
And soon, my darling, I shall be with thee! 

We live, we toil, we die, the grave doth hold 
Our dust whate'er in life we may have been ; 

Ay, all shall be but a vile clod of mould, 

Whate'er our worth in life mankind may ween. 

Yet have we in us an immortal soul, 

And in our hearts are germs of richest fruit — 

Those little parts which form the perfect whole — 
The better self that robs us of the brute. 

And work is noble! life alone is great 

When, put to test of worth, it still survives ; 



THE CITY OF THE DEAD. 53 

So laurel - crown'd, obscure tho' be our fate, 
We bear the sweeter blooms of useful lives. 

So may we labor, foster seeds of worth, 

Grow large in soul, and strive unseen and dumb, 

Toil faithfully to purify the earth, 

And watch and wait till the death angel come. 



54 MORNING. 



MORNING. 

The muffled mists of morning slowly wrap 

Their great gray cloaks about them and depart. 

The dew - drops, one by one, slip off the spray, 

As from the fulness of his mighty heart 

The sun doth kiss earth's glittering tears away, 

And smiling fling bright jewels in her lap. 

Across the fields the cow-boy's merry call 

Comes ringing, and the milkmaid's early song, 

Mixt with the lowing of the distant kine. 

The morning - glories on the mouldered wall 

Are open, bathing in the golden shine, 

And turning from light Zephyr's amorous arms, 

Bare all their bosoms to the roving bee. 

The meadow brooks bound cheerily along, 

And kiss the timid flowers as they flee, 

Leaving them weeping at a trust betray'd. 

Wan, sad - eyed Phosphor in the East hath died ; 



MORNING. 55 

Dimm'd by sweet morning's fuller, fairer charms, 

Hath droopt and paled away like love - sick maid. 

Upon the wave the water - lilies ride, 

And by the shore the silent plover steals, 

Or thither comes a thirsty wren to drink. 

Life overflows with life; but o'er the brink 

Of death's dark river waits some fluttering soul, 

While nearer and yet nearer o'er the roll 

Of those wild waters the weird boatman draws. 

Ah well ! in midst of life we are in death. 

We cannot claim to breathe another breath 

Save God so wills ; immutable, fixt laws 

Enchain our being; let us kneel and pray 

That God has brought us to another day. 



56 LJLL1E DAY. 



LILLIE DAY. 

But to see her was to love her, 
Love but her, and love forever. 

Burns. 

Sweet Liilie Day ! Do you remember her, 

And those brown eyes ? I sometimes used to think, 

That down in yonder hollow she had stol'n 

The color from the hazels when they hung 

Brown - ripe for nutters, in the nutting time. 

A lovely maid, indeed, so gently shy, 

And ever with a little bashful blush 

For an unconsciously too - earnest gaze. 

And so unlike the rest, too — nothing coarse — 

But one had thought she had been reared within 

A higher circle, not illiterate — 

And bred to finer tastes than she had known : 

For nature with that careless, wayward hand 

That drops in Autumn here and there its gold 

And yellow, blending all in harmony, 



LILLIE DAY. 57 

Until it seems some great and grand design 

Wrought by a master of profoundest art — 

And is the Master not of art divine? — 

Had touched her with that sweet and tender grace, 

With that inimitably trusting air, 

And winning, womanly dependence which 

True manhood loves, and ever will protect. 

And yet she bore that proper self-esteem, 

And self-reliance, which is not conceit, 

But fitted her for lovely household joys, 

And in the shine or shade, as Fortune moves, 

A faithful consort — a dear girl indeed. 

Yes, yes it might have been ! Ah well ! you know 

The best of us are liable to err; 

But then I've suffered for it, too, God knows, 

For thro' the silent chambers of my heart, 

Amid the dust and rubbish of long years, 

There ever moves the dark wraith of a day — 

A day once clear and sweet as early love, 

A day long dead, that makes continuous moan, 

"Too late; too late!" I never shall forget 

That morn when last we met and parted last; 
c 



5 8 LJLL1E DAY. 

'Twas down beyond the lower hedge of thorns, 
In farmer Greyson's meadow, near the brook. 
A lamb within the night had lost its dam 
And strayed to Ellisleigh, and coming back 
I took a short cut thro' the meadow - lands. 
The night before, at evensong of birds, 
And when the convent bells at "Ellisleigh 
Rang vesper chimes, which softly heard afar, 
Came to us broken, trembling thro' the dusk, 
Lillie and I had parted angrily, 
With mutual vows of silence evermore. 

O evening bells ! O vesper chimes ! 
O mellow bells of long ago ! 

Ring back again the olden times, 
Ring out old age's frost and snow, 
Ring back youth's summer holiday. 

O saddened bells! O moaning bells! 

With tottering steps, and snow-white hair, 
Upon the beach age gathers shells, 

And lists to catch an echo there, 
Far off, of youth's faint melody. 



LILLIE DAY. 59 

Yes, darling Lillie, and I catch the tint 

And distant tone of thy sweet memory, 

x\nd as I saw thee on that summer morn, 

All, retrospective, rolls in beauty up, 

Catching a halo from the tender past, 

Seen thro' the haze of introverted grief. 

But when I met her there, o'er each brown eye 

The lid droopt low, surcharged with unshed tears, 

As grieving Niobe-like that she had lost 

Her children, all the darling babes of hope. 

X 
But stiffly as a reed beside a pool 

Bends to the tenderest air that morn can move, 

I slightly bow'd, and would have quickly passed, 

But she cried out, " Please, Alvin, wait, I want 

To speak to you. 7 ' I stopt with heedless air, 

And with a cold defiance in my eyes, 

For I had thought to make her humble as 

A chastened child. But when I saw the soft 

Vermillion bloom upon each rounded cheek, 

Her hat blown backward by the morning breeze 

From a white brow upon her golden hair, 

And lips half parted like an opening rose, 



60 LILLIE DAY. 

My heart misgave me, pleading for itself, 

And thro' my love my purpose well-nigh failed. 

She wore a dress of blue soft as the sky, 

And a yellow - hearted daisy in her hair; 

And on her arm a tiny basket hung 

FUfed with wild flowers, but she the fairest there, 

The wild sweet flower of our valley home. 

With doubtful step and an unquiet mien, 

The crimson growing deeper on her cheeks, 

She timidly drew nigh me where I stood. 

Dear girl! she loved me well, and now I am 

The sadder, and I love her only more, 

When I recall those days; though then, in my 

Hot haste and foolish pride, I could not half 

Appreciate such love. Alas ! since then 

I have too often felt its need, and such 

A pure and simply trusting heart as her's. 

With voice subdued she scarcely spoke, but breathed, 

"Alvin, last night I wrong'd you, please forgive," 

And, looking down, brusht off with nervous foot 

The shining beads of dew, that on the grass 

Seem'd diamonds in the light of summer dawn. 



LILLIE DAY. 6 1 

I only whipt the leash, with which I held 

The lamb, against the knotty hedge and kept 

A scornful silence. "Alvin, won't you speak 

To me ? and nevermore ? oh do !" she said. 

To see her thus so meek, with arrogance 

" 'Twas your own fault," I blustered out. " I know, 

But pass it by, for I am sorry now." 

She stood, her hands claspt with beseeching air, 

And every pretty ringlet seem'd to droop 

About her white neck with humility. 

"You had no reason to say what you did," 

I roughly spoke, " and now you need not come 

To whine excuse." " O Alvin !" as if hurt 

She spoke, and then indignant warmth 'roused in 

Her veins, " 'Tis well, sir, you may go; I'll not 

Again come and whine you excuse." Whistling 

A merry air, with reckless stride I passed 

The hedge and green rim of the hollow glen, 

Nor ever once glanced back. And yet beside 

My path the very flowers seem'd to weep, 

And cast reproach at me; the clover hung 

Its glowing head and seernVl to blush with shame 



62 L1LLIE DAY. 

While its white sister, pallid with her grief, 

Bow'd low and sought to hide beneath the fern. 

The blood - root, and the cuckoo - flowers wept, 

And every little flower of celandine 

Snapt from me as I passed along the way. 

That eve I wandered down the narrow lane 

Unto the spring beneath the lilac boughs, 

Where we in love's first days were wont to meet, 

And there for a last time I saw the sun 

Fling purple glory round thro' all the west, 

And tip the waves with flame, and bathe the hills 

In lambent splendor, and dye all the vale 

With broken gleams of day. Above the dusk 

Of intervening boughs and foliage, 

I caught the vision of white chimney tops, 

Beyond the meadows, over farmer Day's, 

And faint and far off echoes of cheery shouts 

From careless herdsmen, and the mellow low 

Of distant cattle. From the glooming dome 

Above, the slow stars one by one peept forth, 

And one from off the blue horizon's rim 

Slipt downward and was caught 'mid other stars, 



LILLIE DAY. 63 

Or lost in ether. Then the convent bells 
At Ellisleigh again rang vesper chimes, 
And throbb'd thro' twilight, and upon the air 
Fell round me grieving, and I grieved alone. 
Sad bells ! sad bells ! O mourn no more ! 

Let sadness sink, and sorrow sleep; 
I will not grieve the moulder'd yore, 
And there can be no cause to weep, 
When earth showers golden praises. 

O sighing bells ! O sobbing bells ! 

Ye call up memories of pain ; 
Your throbbing pulses beat but knells, — - 
The past comes never back again, 
And Hope sleeps 'neath the daisies. 
I never saw her more, for but a few 
Days later I had gone where duty called 
Me to a great bewildering city, where 
I passed the morning of my life in one 
Gay round of hollow pleasure. There mixt in 
The dissipations of a student's life, 
Within the gairish show of city light, 



64 L1LL1E DA Y. 

And in the impure circles of its mirth, 

Surrounded by the parasites of wealth 

And flattered o'er in festive shallowness, 

Amid more dazzling faces, tho' less pure, 

I sometimes learned to partially forget 

The fair fresh image of sweet Lillie Day. 

But often would my heart yearn for her smile, 

And for the mellow "Alvin" of the past. 

Or when some new deceit of the cold world, 

Embittering all my life, had crowded out 

That wholesome love of truth which once was mine, 

And I had come to look with a distrust 

Upon my fellow men, I long'd again 

To live that simple country life, and woo 

That shy and chaste -eyed maiden I had known. 

And as a lily, broken from its stem, 

Is withered, droops and dies, so, I have heard, 

She droopt and slowly faded, day by day, 

Until she died — and died with prayers for me, 

Prayers for my soul, and blessings throughout life. 

So here she sleeps within this modest grave, 

Type of herself, and, friend, my heart has, too, 

With her been buried here; and starving for 



L1LLIE DAT. 65 

Her love, it slowly bleeds its life away, 

While I, rejoicing, only wait for death. 

And I am used of balmy summer nights 

To come and lay my head upon her grave, 

And gazing up to heaven at the stars, 

Believe she, watching, smiles upon me there. 

Or when the evening wind steals thro' the fields, 

And bows the grass beside my lowly head, 

I fancy that she, hovering o'er me, waves 

Her snowy wings, and with her lily hands 

Outstretcht in pity, lingers blessing me. 

I've only suffered in this world, and she 

Has been far happier than I. But now 

My mortal sands are w r ell - nigh run, for on 

My brow are threads of silver, thicker than 

Those of the raven gloss, and my weak limbs 

So fail me that they scarce will bear me more 

To this low mound, where I, both morn and night, 

For years have humbly knelt. Yet I shall see, 

And meet her in that world of mystic life 

Which mortals know not of. And there she 'waits 

Me by a silver singing brook, with wild 

Fresh gathered flowers that shall never die. 



66 MY CLARE. 



MY CLARE. 

A daisy by the wayside, 

A violet in the hedge, 
The crocus in the meadow, 

The cowslip in the sedge, 
Are not by half so modest, 

Are not by half so fair, 
As the pride of all the valley — 

My blue - eyed maiden, Clare. 

The poppy in the garden, 

The roses, red and white, 
The pink and aster-flowers, 

The lily, tall and light, 
Are not by half so stately, 

And not by half so rare, 
So queenly yet so gentle, as 

My blue - eyed maiden, Clare. 



TO ETTA. 67 



TO ETTA. 

O never try to blind the eye 
To one's own faults and follies, 

But while you pass a brother's by, 
In own heart purge what sullies. 

To know we err, and that we stir 
Within the heart its darkest evil, 

Is just to self, and to prefer 

To scan one's own faults is but civil. 

Tis better far to know we are 

In error than our brother, 
And find in self that which doth mar 

Our morals than another. 

And ne'er condemn your fellow men, 
The path is full of thorns and narrow; 



68 TO ETTA. 

Within us all since time began 

Hath been what none might wish to borrow. 

For life is bleak, and men are weak, 

And all are apt to stumble; 
So let us, therefore, ever seek 

To make our own hearts humble. 

Then never try to blind the eye 
To one's own faults and follies, 

But while you pass your brother's by, 
In own heart purge what sullies. 



WHEN I DIE 69 



WHEN I DIE. 

How gently Summer dies 

And sweetly fade the early flowers away; 

The waning moon slips softly into day, 

And stars go out amid the quiet skies. 

We note the changing leaves, 

How gradually, o'er all the Autumn wold, 

They take the hue of sunset, or of gold, 

Ere the Great Reaper garners up his sheaves. 

Upon the grass dies off its primal green, 

So slowly more and more, we scarcely ween 

That it hath changed : 

Oh! when I die 

May death come unto me as quietly, 

And thro' the shadowy valley may I go 

So noiselessly, that one might hardly know 

My soul had heavenward ranged. 

I would not pass 



70 WHEN I DIE. 

With strong, fierce struggles to still cling to life; 

But go with that Still Guest 

Out happily from all the world's rude strife 

To some green spot, where I might lay me by 

And fold my hands in rest. 

'Twould vex sweet memory, 

And love in after -days would weep, 

And would mistrust the sweetness of my sleep, 

When under grass, 

Remembering that life fought hard to stay. 

Oh, let us be kind ! 

Life at the best is brief; 

Why should we fill its scanty days with grief? 

Ah, love is blind 

With weeping in remorse beside the dead ; 

But tears cannot reanimate the clay, 

Or for a moment make the still heart beat, 

And we can only weep, and heart must bleed. 

Oh, let us be kind ! 

Our lives are like a reed, 

Frail, and lie broken by some passing wind. 

Ah ! years are very fleet ; 



WHEN I DIE. 7 1 

Why should we fill them up with bitterness ? 

Time from our bosoms plucks the dear ones off, 

And they cannot return our fond caress, 

Or those cold lips respond with kiss for kiss. 

Be kind : for in a little we shall miss 

The pleasant smile, nor hear love spoken words, 

Nor longer in the heart shall love's sweet chords 

Vibrate. Oh, let us doff 

Our sterner natures : we shall, too, be dumb, 

And kindred hands shall hide us under sod 

With maiiY tears — love cancel all the sum 

Of life's poor foibles, and say, 

" Is this the end ? from night to fullest day 

Ascended ? Aye so smiling, sweet, and calm \ 

Yet death than grief hath furnished kinder balm ; 

For, tho' we know that the dear one hath gone 

Thro' darkness, he hath journeyed not alone, 

For Thou didst lead him thither, oh my God." 



72 RETRACTION. 



RETRACTION. 

What of our love : the winds may woo the flowers, 
The sun may move to sun, the moon to moon, 

The clouds exhaust themselves in summer showers • 
But at thy hands no more I crave a boon t 

What time the apple ripens ere its fall 
From fulness doth it pass to perfect fruit; 

The birds from vernal -morn to harvests call, 
But at the sign of polar wrath are mute: 

My heart is dumb ; no morning light of eyes 
Shall call the vanished minstrels back again. 

Far in the To - come other stars arise, 

But in the earlier heavens lo! thine wane. 

The yestermorn again may never be; 

The fairest fortunes slip from glow to gloom ; 



RETRACTION, 73 

High o'er the past weeps sad Mnemosyne, 
And the dead rose again may never bloom. 

Yet hold no censure where such cannot prove : 
The tender vine against the rough oak's bark 

Must wear and wither; and the heart will move 
To genial light from out a dreary dark. 

" If I had known," the barren, barren cry : 
The lonely soul will sometime find a mate. 

And uncongenial loves must surely die, 

In flower or bud; for truest hearts will wait. 

But what is this? I see the warm tears press 
Up to the quivering lid, lov'st thou so much ? 

And rises in me, too, strange tenderness — 
Nay, touch me not, I yield but at a toach. 

I've heard in after years two hearts may close 
In happy unison thro' wedded love, 

E'en as the rosebud merges in the rose 

Full blown, or twilight - dawn to day doth move. 



74 RETRACTION. 

Re -take me, darling; dead that harsh resolve, 
Harsh, that fulfilled had wrought me wretched 
doom ; 

And hourly may we each in each involve, 
Two lives a perfect flower in perfect bloom. 



THE POET'S INHEBITANCE. J 5 



THE POET'S INHERITANCE. 

Sweet are the uses of adversity. — As You Like It % 

me, what a vast heritage is mine ! 
Tho' Poverty has often claspt my hand, 
And want with me familiarly lockt arms, 

Nor I can claim as friends those of large dower 
In real estate, or bonds, or stocks, or gold, 
Yet am I heir to greater wealth than these. 
Mine yonder hills, and rocks, and summer flowers, 
The wide free air, the bounteous streams and groves, 
The emerald meads, rich skies, and downy clouds, 
And all the lavish beauty nature holds. 
When rosy fingers of the dawn reach out 
And grasp the summits of the far - off hills 
To thither plant the oriflamme of day, 
And sprinkle red profusion of the morn 
Round all the valleys and the sapphire sea, 

1 wander forth o'er gleaming lawns and leas, 



7 6 THE POETS INHERITANCE. 

And every lowly flower and wayside weed 

Stands robed in splendor, glistening o'er with jewels, 

And, bending down, all meekly kiss my feet, 

And render homage unto me who hold 

A sovereignty above them; for they know 

I love to sing their simple loveliness, 

And yield me rich returns, as vassals made 

By God to do my will. The gleeful birds 

Pour in my ears their ditties of the morn, 

Till all my soul o'erflows with melody, 

And life within me leaps to one full song. 

I know th' exquisite odor of the rose 

Is all, all mine, and those fine pencillings 

Which nature in her secret studio 

Has drawn upon the canvas of her leaves, 

Or delicately traced in gentle curves 

Of landscape, river, tree, or cataract, 

On frosty panes, or dasht with random touch 

A deeper purple on a clover bloom. 

The daisy that springs by the dusty road 

Grows for the humble, and I claim it mine. 

And dainty violets that beneath the hedge 



THE POETS INHERITANCE. J 7 

Blow all unseen, and modest heather - bells, 

I pluck and know that they were made for me. 

Mine, all mine, is the wealth of earth's full beauty, 

The freedom of the forests and the fields, 

The light of sun, sweet moon, and trembling stars 

The mellow tunes of birds and weeping brooks, 

The long song of the locusts in the trees, 

And every gentle wind, and heavens fleckt 

With tints of flying light on summer eves. 

But more beyond the worth of these I prize 

The warm and hearty clasp of the hard hand 

Of honest laborers, the tender heart 

And loyal, and the truly upright mind; 

The soul so independent that it scorns 

All bondage in the fellowship of wrong, 

But nobly moves to right, and will not swerve, 

Thro' selfishness, or to gain selfish ends, 

Out unto this temptation or to that. 

Let never poor man think that he is poor 

Who counts among his friends such friends as these — 

Our mother nature, and the simple hind 

Who knows no evil; such are friends indeed, 



78 THE POETS INHERITANCE. 

And such my heritage; O who could claim 

A vaster ? Not in halls of revelry 

And princely splendor may such wealth be found, 

As this. For nature yields not herself up 

To those that woo with gold and precious stones, 

But unto those that come in honesty, 

With soul unfettered and a spotless heart. 



THE PRESENT. 79 



THE PRESENT. 

What matter we have suffered, love, and borne 
A thousand pangs, when we are lying low ? 

What matter we have drunk the lees of scorn, 
And wept our griefs, as we are weeping now, 

When naked in the grave we lie forlorn ? 

What matter, love, that you and I have kept 
A heart of tenderness thro' unkind years, 

When in the sepulcher we shall have slept 
For fifty moons, and Memory dried her tears 

And smile beside the tomb where late she wept ? 

I know when we are gone the flowers will bloom, 
And in their seasons leaves will fall and come 

Again, and the young birds sing o'er our tomb; 
But still what matter ? We shall both be dumb, 

And lockt in silence and eternal gloom. 



80 THE PRESENT. 

What matter, love, tho' Spring and Summer wane 
And Winter come with chilling sleet and snow, 

Or on our graves the flowers weep in rain, 
Or on our graves the flowers forget to blow, 

What matter, love ? we cannot then feel pain. 

Should others love as you and I have loved, 
What matter? we shall mingle hearts in dust; 

Should others prove as you and I have proved, 
So faithful, and not forfeit heaven's best trust, 

What matter ? for they move as we have moved. 

Come, come away; O now we will not mourn 
For that which is not ; and the past is past ; 

Tho' faded joys shall never more return, 
Neither shall faded griefs, the first or last, 

And fullest joys are of the present born. 

O love, what may be shall not weight the heart, 
Nor rob joy of the present, which is our's; 

Now, now we'll clasp and laugh at death, nor part, 
And make these which we have, most golden hours 

And when the Dread Voice call, together start. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY, 

A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

To A. V. J. 

— Weigh thou thy cross 
With Christ's, and judge which were the heavier. 
Joy even in thine anguish! — such was His, 
But measurelessly more. Thy suffering 
Assimilateth thee to Him. — Festzis — Bailey. 

I would not come intrusive on thy grief, 
Too deep, too holy for a stranger's touch, 

But tenderly, with words of sweet relief, 
And, tho' I fail, receive thou this as such. 

Nor would I call up memories of pain, 

Nor cause the phantoms of the past to start 

From their seclusions to haunt thee again, 
And pace the empty chambers of thy heart. 

And w 7 hat is sympathy ? but love that sleeps, 
Or moves within us at another's woe, 

Saying, 'Tis thus his grief my brother weeps, 
And O, 't is thus I w r ept mine, long ago. 

D 



82 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

So knowing somewhat of thy larger sorrow, 
O let me come in tenderness and love, 

And mourn the blight and loneness of thy morrow, 
And w T ith thee thro 7 the darkness let me move. 

And let me enter in thy sacred bower, 

And take thy place, and call thy grief mine own, 

That I, by this poor song, for but an hour, 

From off the grave where thou dost weep alone, 

May lift thee up to look upon the fields, 
Aud on the forest, or the happy sky, 

Where, hope on hope, each starry system reels, 
And paths of peace stretch over all on high. 

And O, forgive if these seem idle words, 
Forgive me if I hurt where I would heal, 

And tho' I strike in gloom but jarring chords 
Forgive me, and together we will- kneel. 

It was a wisdom higher than we know 

That called thy dearest one to brighter day; 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. $>3 

It was an angel o'er her couch bent low 

And whispered, " Darling, darling, come away ! 

"Thine heavenly father waits for thee above; 

With robe and crowns he waits to let thee in; 
Come in thy flower of chastity and love, 

Come in thy purity, come out from sin." 

Believe 'twas well! thou canst not know His ways; 

The lily blooms, transplanted by His care, 
In fuller beauty, and the diamond's blaze 

In that rich light 's more radiant, more rare. 

O friend ! I know 't is hard — so bright, so fair ! 

And naught the sting, the void of death removes ; 
Yet thou shalt know her, thou shalt meet her there, 

And " The Lord chasteneth them that he loves." 



The willing hands lay folded 
Over the patient breast; 

The true heart, large and loving, 
Forever was at rest; 



84 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

The thin hair, dashed with silver, 
Back from the meek brow crept, 

And the waxen lids closed gently, 
As tho' the dead one slept. 

About the sweet mouth lingered 

A peaceful, happy smile, 
As tho' she dreamed of Paradise — 

In sleep dwelt there awhile; 
Her mission now was ended, 

Her woman's duty done, 
Each weary task was finished, 

And a higher life begun. 

They miss a mother's greeting, 

They miss a mother's care, 
I miss a true wife's presence, 

I miss a pure wife's prayer. 
We closed the coffin gently, 

With tears heaped sod around, 
And planted a single rose-tree 

Over that hallowed ground, 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 85 

I miss thee at eve when the robin is calling, 
When the stars, pale and silent, look down thro' 
the night, 
When the cold dews from heaven are silently falling, 
And the hills in the distance grow dim on my 
sight. 

When the rose and the lily both softly are sleeping, 
And the zephyrs of evening do mournfully sigh, 

And the willow, for pity, in silence is weeping 
O'er the marble and turf of thy grave shadow'd 
nigh. 

When the reeds, by the tarn, as in sorrow are 
drooping. 
And the waters do murmur a pleasant " good 
night," 
When the clouds from the West o'er the dark sky 
are trooping, 
Like a great mystic army of Cyclops in flight. 

O darling, I miss thee, and am lonely, am lonely, 
And the blue of the sky has grown dark unto me, 



86 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

And the flowers once radiant are fair to me only, 
For I centered the soul of earth's beauty in thee. 



I pluckt a flower of tenderest growth, 
And in my bosom shelter gave; 

I sheltered it, it lookt so frail, 

And thought to wear it to the grave. 

Years swept away on golden wings, 
And still I guarded my frail flower; 

But by mishap, for Fate was wroth, 
I lost it in an evil hour. 

For closed within its petals white, 
Thro' passing years had lain a germ, 

And, slowly ripening day by day, 
At last lay writhing there, a worm. 

It fell upon my tender flower, 

When it was in its sweetest bloom, 

And suckt the vigor from its life, 
Until it faded to the tomb. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 87 

Then entering into my own breast, 

By prayer, nor threat, 'twill ne'er depart, 

And while the years go slowly by, 
It feeds forever on my heart. 



Hark thee ! hark thee ! gentle brooklet, 

Pause one moment in thy song. 
Thou shaft hear a tale of sorrow — 

How my heart hath suffered long : — 
Long ago, within the valley 

Where the sky is ever blue, 
Dwelt a maid — a modest maiden, 

Meek and lovely, meek and true. 

And I woo'd that gentle maiden, 

When the Spring was fresh and fair — 
When the boughs were white with blossoms, 

And their fragrance laid the air; 
O her heart was young and tender, 

But sweet innocence it knew, 
And she whispered that she lov'd me. 

And the moments gladly flew. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Summer waned, and Autumn's crescent 

Shone o'er wold, and mead, and river, 
And the full pulse in our bosoms 

Grew forever and forever; 
And the dying season bore the 

Loving maid to happy wife; 
Fruitage crowned the vernal promise 

With a dearer life in life. 

But another came and claimed her — 
Robb'd me of my darling bride; 

When life's primrose leaves were falling- 
Came the Stranger — and she died; 

Died and left me in the valley, — 
Purple twilight, diamond dew, 

Where the spring boughs droop with blossoms, 
And the sky is ever blue. 

But its loveliness is faded, 

For she filled my heart alone, 
And the valley - light is darkened, 

For the central sun is gone; 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 89 

Never was there such another, 

O the blight, the hopeless change! 

Not a comfort for my sorrow 

Furnishes the wide world's range. 

Brooklet, only thou art happy, 

And I fain would lay my head — 
For the coming years but whisper, 

" Thou to Death again shalt wed" — 
Where thy waters make low music, 

And the violets ever bloom, 
For methinks I'd sleep the sweeter, 

And less chill would be the tomb. 



O had I known that thou should'st go 
So early, sweetlier I had moved, 
Tho' none could love thee as I loved, 

Yet moods of care sometimes broke thro', 

While all the heaven of life was fair, 
And made dark for a little space; 



D A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Tho' love was stirrM not from his place, 
I mourn ev'n flitting clouds were there. 

I sorrow — like the hapless youth' 
Who loves in secret some fair maid, 
Who loves, yet bears it all unsaid, 

Nor dares to whisper of the truth. 

Dawn moves to dark, and dark to dawn, 
And, sijent, still he dares not speak, 
Till comes, at last, the fateful week, 

The day, the hour, and she is gone. 

And then he mourns occasion lost, 
And all the weakness of his plight 
That gave no hope, and thro' the night 

He dreams and wanders, trouble - tost ; 

Or wakes, and vainly on the gloom 
He strives to fix her features there, 
But cannot, for they fade in air, 

And break and scatter round the room. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 9 1 

And yet he holds within his thought 
A broken memory as she is, 
And tho' the general whole he miss, 

His soul with gleams of her is fraught; 

And o'er the numbness of his pain, 

A far - off hope is glistening thro', 

As overspreads the shining blue, 
Trees weeping crystal after rain. 



The past is like a dream to me, 

Its phantom scenes oft come and go, 
And come again, or quickly flee 

Their joys, their happiness, their woe. 
When backward o'er her dust strown track, 

Memory flits to former scenes, 
A many darling friends come back, 

A harvest of old friends she gleans; 
But they 're not real, they 're only traced 

Upon the dust of the dim past, 
Tho' not by passing years erased, 

Their transient forms not always last. 



92 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

O that I could one friend recall, 
Or bring back other days long fled, 

Or that this weary life might fall, 
And I could sleep beside the dead ! 



A child by a brook in a meadow lay, 
And toyed with flowers as, bright and gay, 
They grew by the side of the mossy brink 
Of the brook, where he lay him down to drink, 
As he thirsted in his play. 

O'er the western hills scarce shone the sun, 
Telling that day was almost done, 
And slanting down on his golden hair, 
And lingering o'er his forehead fair, 
Dropt kisses, one by one. 

But the child, as he gazed, with sweet surprise, 
On the glowing hues of the western skies, 
And then on the flowers that nodded by, 
He thought, Ah, how soon they will fade and die, 
And tears filled his childish eyes. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 93 

He wept, and with 'plaints on his lisping tongue, 
To his mother he hied, and round her flung 
His arms, and he askt her why all must die, 
But she answered her child with a bitter sigh, 
Such grief should seek one so young. 

I gazed where the beams from the western sky 
Fell over the green grave nestling nigh, 
And wept, like the child, with a wordless tongue, 
But, unlike the child, that I died not young ; 
Ere she that did so die. 



If o'er that cloud which sweeps the sky 

My soul could for one one moment be, 
I'd bid it to ascend on high, 

And quickly fly, my love, to thee ; 
And floating upward thro' the air, 

I'd leave below earth's dreary goal, 
And o'er yon fleecy clouds we there 

Should meet again, and soul clasp soul. 



94 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Thus freed from every passion's sway, 

That marks the course of man below, 
And separates the soul from clay — 

Then I, too, love, thy joy might know ; 
Then I might clasp thee as of yore, 

And strain thee to my yearning breast — 
Oh! I would know joy as before, 

When thro' thee I was doubly blest. 

But could I meet thee o'er yon cloud, 

And see again thine own dear face, 
Then as I saw thee in thy shroud, 

When rigid, lockt in Death's embrace, — 
I might forget, and memory 

Would cease to call back that dark scene, 
And from my heart the wish would flee 

To know again that which hath been. 

Ay, freed from every earthly care, 

And reunited in love's bliss, 
Our souls should lightly tread the air, 

And seek a world more fair than this, 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 95 

Where Death no more his knell should strike, 

And cyclic time forever cease — 
Where we, as one, should love alike, 

And find for aye a deathless peace. 



Here I sit by the ruin alone, 

And the mosses grow thick at my feet, 

Grow thickly and cover each stone, 

Grow thickly and cover my seat; 

And the roses all withered and blown, 

And the pansies that once were so sweet, 

Are choked by the brambles that round them have 

grown, 
In the years that have winnow'd and taken the 

wheat, 
Have taken, and left chaff alone. 

And I sit and I muse all alone 

By this ruin so gray and so bare ; 

And the blasts 'round the turrets beat howling, and 

moan, 
And decay, pale and damp, hovers in the dark air — 



g6 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Alas ! all beauty is gone ! 

Thro' all the blank windows the blue heavens stare, 

And all I once knew is now strange and unknown 

And nothing remains that is fair; 

Not even the strength of the cataract's tone 

Of the past an echo may bear. 

And lonely, I sit here alone; 

O how dreary and dark is the day! 

And my life has grown sombre, my joys they -have 

flown, 
And my heart has grown wrinkled and gray; 
My pleasures have taken a soberer tone, 
My passions are cold, cold as clay; 
Up thro' the dread past there cometh a moan 
O'er hopes that are colder than they, 
And like the dead blossoms that round me are 

strown, 
My life has all withered away. 



Ah ! when the sigh heaves from the breast, 
And when our tears fall thick and fast, 



A SOXG OF SYMPATHY. 97 

Sometime the troubled soul must rest, 
And peace and quiet come at last. 

I think this cannot always be, 

The morbid mind, the gloomy eye; 

The grief that saps the soul must flee, 
Or else life's springs forever dry. 

I know when weary hearts are torn, 
And sore and bleeding faint with grief, 

Or o'er crusht hopes are doom'd to mourn, 
In solitude they find relief. 

When backward thro' the misty past, 
O'er earlier paths with pain we tread, 

With trembling hearts our hopes we cast 
On what may come, the present dead. 

Ah ! they who have known not such gloom 
Can ne'er the pain — the anguish feel, 

When cold and silent in the tomb 

Lies all that made Life's pleasance real. 



98 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

When we ensepulchered behold 

Our idols dead — O mouldered hope! — - 
Against distrust arrayed, enrolled, 

In weakened faith we cannot cope. 

when I blankly on the sod 

Gaze where my loved one lies beneath, 
Could I but trust, but hope in God, 
And kiss the rod that smites in death, 

1 know that I should grow in love, 
And grow in knowledge more divine, 

With fuller joy in things above, 

If faith were mine, if faith were mine. 

Death his cold seal upon her prest, 
And froze in peace her marble brow, 

Yet I will think 'twas for the best — 
She's free from care and trouble now. 

Tho' only senseless clay remain, 

And still the voice, and cold the form, 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 99 

Tho' in the earth its casket's lain, 

The soul still lives with love yet warm. 



All the hills are softly sleeping 

Underneath an azure haze, 
And a languid life is creeping 

Thro' the still September days; 
Sluggishly the brooks are flowing, 

Thro' the meadows wimpling, 
Round the cresses, in the sunbeams, 

Golden smiles are dimpling. 

There are patches in the meadows, 

Mottled herds - grass, brown and red, 
And the alders in the shadows 

Bow with fruit the laden head; 
Sleepy cattle in the pastures 

Lazily are grazing, 
And a few leaves on the maples 

O'er the hills are blazing. 



IOO A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

From the nodding thistle - blossoms 

Bees their honey -horns are filling; 
Ceres bright, with swelling bosoms, 

Shakes her tresses to the trilling 
Of a bird that thro' the stillness 

To its mate is calling; 
While, anon, from burthened branches 

Ripened fruit is falling. 

Plovers in the marsh and mallow 

Search their prey with stealthy tread, 
And, belated, one lone swallow 

Homeward wheels in sunset red. 
There's a tinge upon the treetops, 

Meadow plains, and wooded ridges — 
In the darkened vale the brooklets 

Gleam beyond their moss-grown bridges. 

Shadows fade — the sun hath fallen 
From the blue rim of the West, 

O'er the hills hath Dian stolen 
With an ever pallid crest; 



A SONG OF S YMPA THY. I O I 

By the river, gentle zephyrs 

Whisper to the drowsy tide, 
Of their late loves with the flowers, 

Ere in summer heat they died. 

Reapers in the dusk are singing 

Songs of harvest, gay and blithe, — 
Ceased the weary daylong swinging, 

And the sweeping of the scythe; 
Or is heard in mellow moonlight 

The quick stripping of the husk, 
Or lusty lads and lissome lasses 

A - tripping money - musk. 

And I alone, when all in splendor 

Is of Autumn beauty clad, 
Do of earth so much engender 

That is lonely and is sad. 
Hush, my spirit, hush thy wailing, 

Here for sorrow is not room, 
Forms of beauty o'er thee sailing 

Do invite thee from thy gloom. 



I O 2 A SONG OF S YMPA THY. 

Sweet one, to die 
With the fall of the leaves, 
When October sunshine goldenly weaves 

A beautiful shroud, — 

Thro' the dark vale 
To go down to the tomb, 
Bearing a torch of the year thro' the gloom 

Of death and the grave, — 

To fade, fade away, 
And to sleep with the flowers, — 
To lie, softly lie,- at sleep with the showers 

Of soft summer days; — 

Blushing to die, 
On my cheek the bright glow, 
While deeper the red flush of nature did grow, — 

In splendor to die 

Would, love, be bliss; 
For then I might be - 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 103 

Forever and ever at sleep, love, with thee, 
Deep, deeply asleep. 

Reapers at work 
Gather in the full sheaves, 
And the still, the invisible reaper of leaves 

Doth garner his store. 

O that I might pass 
To the grave with the year, 
And lie, love, lie to thee ever so near 

In death's visionless sleep. 

To wane off in light, 
With the season to die, 
And on the cold bosom of Winter to lie, 

Lie coldly at rest. 

And blossoming Spring 
With its birds would awake, 
And the startled year a new impulse take, 

Yet still I should sleep. 



104 A SONG OF SYMPATHY, 

Out upon the meadow breezes 

Is there borne incense of death ; 
Tis voluptuous Summer dying, 

'Tis her latest farewell breath. 
By the holt, the thistle blossoms, 

In their royal robes of state, 
Doff their purple for dun mantles, 

And for death and Winter wait. 

Half the trees are bare and leafless, 

Stript of all their wealth of gold; 
Thickly strewn in every hollow 

Of the gray and silent wold, 
Sere and crisp, they ever rustle 

'Neath the Autumn nutter's tread ; - 
In the fields few tufts of grasses, 

Left from aftermath, lie dead. 

By the river, still and darkling, 
Sombre willows droop and bend, 

Casting fret -work in the current, 
Where the light and shadow blend; 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 105 

Whispering flags fringe all the margin, 

Where the waters stillest flow, 
And a brooklet wastes its fullness 

Where the mint and sedge - grass grow. 

Stands a zinnia in the garden 

Sole survivor of its kind; 
Over all the porch, tho' withered, 

Still the morning - glories wind. 
Here a fiery gladiolus 

Eades before the touch of frost, 
And a marigold, brown - hearted, 

Has its yellow lustre lost. 

But I see another landscape, 

Time has whitened it with frost, 
And before its blasting touches 

Fades away a mighty host; 
Ever downward to death's valley 

Fading, never one survives, 
In the Autumn -time of mortals, 

The October of our lives. 



Io6 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

It rains, and o'er the earth a gloom 
Hangs heavy in the chilly air, 
As when, despondent, o'er a tomb 
One bends and drops the hot tear there, 
And sighs and moans with pain. 

Dark leaden clouds weep in the sky, 
And freeze the earth with tears of grief, 
The dreary winds go whistling by, 
And whirl the seared and crisped leaf, 
O'erburthened with the rain. 

The aged trees sway to and fro, 
And wildly toss each naked arm, 
And all the gusts that come and go 
Are wild with glee at their alarm, 
And howl to hear them groan. 

Upon the hillside, bleak and bare. 
The withered flowers decaying lie — 
Lie withered all, save here and there, 
Late blooming, one is left to die 
Companionless, alone. 



A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 107 

In all the forest, deep and wide, 
Are husht the gladsome sounds of Spring, 
Save as the rills still revelling glide 
To frozen muteness, woodlands ring, 
And wakes the solitude. 

And still it rains unceasingly, 
And still the winds go whistling by, 
Yet groans and sways each aged tree, 
And o'er the hills the lone flowers die ; — 
A welcome, Winter rude! 

Ay welcome, Winter, if ye bear 
Within your icy breast a heart, 
Shall wean me from my bitter care, 
Or cause with frost those chains to start 
That bind my spirit down. 

O if ye bring a sweet relief, 
In drifting snow and driving blast, 
Shall turn me from this rancorous grief, 
Upon ye all my hope I cast, 
And King of seasons crown. 



[o8 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Oh, let no sounds of wanton earth 
Break on the stillness of my woe; 

I cannot bear the careless mirth 
I used to join in, long ago. 

Come not with mirth that vexeth grief; 

Oh, sorrow loveth silence best; 
The wind that whirls the fallen leaf 

Is kinder, tho' it cannot rest. 

Oh, let me weep : why should I come ? 

The chill that creeps around my heart, 
Although my lips are pale and dumb, 

A chill to others will impart. 

Go for a little; let me be; 

A little longer I would stay; 
All round breathes sympathy with me, 

In kindly quiet; I may pray. 



Unknown, forgotten dost thou sleep, 
Lone mortal, in the lap of earth, 



A SOXG OF SYMPATHY. IO9 

Thy virtues all are buried deep, 

And all thy joys, and all thy worth, 
Are passed from earth, and lie with thee, 
Nor hold a place in memory. 

And what thou wert we do not know, 
But what thou art we do behold — 

Oh ! we must with thee, too, lie low, 
And death's great mystery unfold; 

And if, perchance, it be our lot, 

Must lie like thee alone, forgot. 

Must pass into that silent life, 

Like thine our name lost to the world, 

Lost to the busy haunts of strife, 
Our deeds deep in oblivion hurled; 

Ay, of our grave the very trace 

Be lost, nor known our resting place. 

Bat there is sweetness in thy sleep, 

And in its quietness is peace; 
Nor friends do mourn, nor kindred weep, 

And sounds of pain and sorrow cease; 



110 A SONG OF S YMPA TtlT. 

Ay! in thy lonely grave is rest, 
And, tho' forgotten, thou art blest. 

That other grave beneath the hill — 
O must it, too, become forgot ? 

When death this grieving tongue shall still, 
And when this troubled heart is not, 

Will none the spot in memory hold 

Where mixt my darling's mould with mould? 

And when the meek - eyed violets bloom, 
And in the wood frail windflowers blow, 

Will none pass reverent by her tomb, 
And, for the sake of her below, 

Strew, wet with Memory's hallowed tear, 

The blossoms there she held most dear ? 

It were a comfort could I know, 
That only o'er her sacred head 

The sweet wildflowers might ever grow, 
And careless feet not o'er it tread; 

Nor heedless eyes be cast in mirth, 

Where lies my jewel hid in earth. 



A SOXG OF SYMPATHY. 1 1 1 

Far in the West the red sun sinks from sight, 

From all the rosy sky fast fades the light, 

And twilight pale gives way to deepening night. ] 

Thus day recedes and the old year doth die, 
Fraught with each golden dream, each little joy, 
That evermore shall live in memory. 

Ay. memory still clings to every scene, 

That from our tired brain its cares could wean, — 

Tho' now they are but that which once hath been. 

A future stretches drear and wide away, 
Replete with all that agitates this clay — 
All conquerors, but dying in their day. 

Ah yes ! a future veiled from mortal eyes : 

Betwixt the now and then a limit lies, 

As year that follows year successive dies; — 

Thus twixt the present and the future glides 
A dusky shade, that from us ever hides 
Of good or evil all whate'er betides. 



112 A SONG OF STMPA THY. 

could we tread the future's shadow'd ways, 
Or could the misty veil which clouds our gaze 
Be lifted to reveal the coming days — 

1 ask would mortals then more happy be? 
Would there be joy in knowing Fate's decree? 
We know not, it hath been ordained wisely. 



Where late the last beam of the sun 
Slept for a moment, then away 
Ran forward to its parent day, 

Dark shadows rest; the day is done. 

The moon from o'er yon hills' broad brows 
Looks cold and white against the sky, 
And where the snows of Winter lie 

Flashes afar, and lighter grows. 

Far - stretching backward, rugged pines 
I trace in long and shadow'd rows, 
And still and sullen onward flows 

The river thro' its deep ravines. 



A 8 ONG OF b YMPA THY. 1 1 3 

And twinkle thro' the frosty air 

And dance a million happy lights, — ■ 
Bright stars, that lit on other nights 

A summer landscape, soft and fair; 

Or listened unto lover's vows 

With brighter light, or quicker dance, 
And shot each silver tipped lance 

Earthward from all their myriad bows. 

Anon comes shivering thro' the air 
The bell that evening worship tolls, 
That calls together kindred souls, 

With common purpose — common prayer. 

Down on the low verge of the West 
Faint traces linger, where the sun 
Set his last footsteps, ere begun 

The march again that brings no rest. 

It wanes apace — now wholly gone 
Shines out with fuller light each star, 



114 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

Tho' lustre - dimm'd, for from afar 
Fair Luna reigns as queen alone. 

O love, I think that thou may'st be 
A star in yonder glowing sky, 
And where thou stoopest from on high 

Shed down thy light of love o'er me. 

Oh no ! it is a foolish thought, 

But grief my better sense o'erwhelms \ — 
I know within God's distant realms 

Thou dwellest with the angels, fraught 

With former love, unmarr'd by years, 
With former love, yet grown to more, 
And ever growing, o'er and o'er, 

Thro' an eternity it wears. 



Hail ! thou blithe spirit of the Spring, 
I welcome thee! joys thou dost bring 
Of meadows green and vernal showers, 
Of blooming trees and radiant flowers, 



A SOJVG OF SYMPA THY. 1 1 5 

Of balmy air and zephyrs mild, 

And scenes of beauty undefiled 

By Winter's breath, so icy chill, 

I welcome all ! Perchance they fill 

Many an aching heart with glee, 

E'en as this hour's joy comes from thee. 

This weary frame with strength renewed, 

And this poor heart, with hope indued, 

Shall from their tasks no more recoil, 

But once again return to toil. 

My spirit, in this wondrous change, 

Expands, and takes a wider range. 

And now, to contemplation given, 

I feel with God that all is well, 

And Spring, thro' thee, I'm drawn from Hell, 
And nearer unto Heaven. 



O'er yonder mountain, field, and fell, 
My eyes with signs of Him are met, 

Who made the earth, and said "Tis well," 
And in the clouds a rainbow set — 
A covenant divine. 



110 A SONG OF SYMPATHY. 

The gurgling rill, each tiny flower. 
Each tree with full fruition crown'd, 

Each globe of dew, each summer shower, 
And every blade of grass around, 
And clouds and lowing kine, — 

The birds that wing the throbbing air, 
The myriad insects, finny hordes, 

And all things good, and all things fair, 
Beyond the fragile power of words, — 
Are things our God hath made. 

I look, at night, on moon and stars, 
Each orb bound in its perfect place, 

Or on the tremulous northern bars, 

And know that all thro' boundless space 
Are by His wisdom weighed. 

His love within the leaden sod 
Gives life unto the sowers' seed; 

I pluck the daisy by the road, 

Or from its stalk an humble weed, 
And lo! God's seal is there. 



A SOXG OF STJIPA TRY. 1 1 7 

Within, above, around, below, 

The fulness of his perfect love; 
And nature's teachings, thro' and thro', 

Are manifest of Him above, 
And of a wondrous care. 

The laws that bind us, suns and worlds, 

He holds or looses at a breath, 
And systems into chaos hurls, 

And naught survives the wreck of death — 
Annihilation all. 

But passing grace ! O mercy's ways ! 

The God of power is God of love, 
And he who follows and obeys, 

And who for succor looks above, 
He raiseth from the fall. 

His hand is on the wrathful seas, 

His foot is on the stubborn land, 
His voice rides o'er the swelling breeze, 

And all things witness his command, 
And summer songsters tell. 



1 1 8 A SONG OF SYMPA TH?. 

Death, too, is vassal to his will : 
In loss to find but fuller gains 

Are our afflictions; with us still 
The larger hope of love remains; 
" He doeth all things well. ,, 

And I do know that in each change 
Which earth thro' all its epochs run, 

And all within the mighty range 
Of being ripening 'neath the sun, 
His wisdom works alone. 

What tho' my noon was overfraught, 
And all its glow sunk into night; 

Eve has thro' purple clouds but caught 
A glory — God thro' grief made bright, 
To lead me to His throne. 



ALLIE HOORE. 119 



ALLIE MOORE. 

In this dim world of clouding cares 
We rarely know, till wildered eyes 
See white wings lessening up the skies, 

The angels with us unawares. 



And aye we seek and hunger on 

For precious pearls and relics rare, 
Strewn on the sands for us to wear 

At heart for love of her that's gone. 

Gerald Massey. 

— Thro' all this tract of years 
Wearing the white flower of a blameless life. 

Tennyson. 

I. 
O Allie Moore, the daughter of an hour! 
With thee life was not that which giveth joy, 
But in the fair young morning of its birth, 
'Twas nipt by a cold contact with the world, 
And withered at a frigid touch of fate. 
Yes, dead — long dead! thou hast again returned 



120 ALLIE MOORE. 

Back unto that mysterious viewlessness, 

Whence erstwhile thou didst draw a conscious life. 

Ah ! back unto that unknown, silent realm, 

Of which we catch but dim, vague glimpses here, 

Well nigh eclipsed by all that cloud of mist 

Which rises off the mystic tide of death, 

And mortal eyes may never penetrate. 

Who can interpret the dark mystery 

That now involves thee ? Thou hast passed from us; 

We think thou art not dead, although thy dust 

Is nigh us, with us, precious in itself. 

But that sweet something, purer, better far; 

That mystic inner being, called the soul, 

We hope, we trust, in simple child - like faith, 

Expands in beauty in God's Paradise. 

Ay, tho' we cannot know thee as thou art — 

For thou art higher than our thoughts can reach — 

We do believe thou lookest down on us, 

And watchest us with love ineffable. 

Nay, we believe that thou art with us, tho 7 

We see thee not, in broad - eyed watchful day, 

And love to think thou bendest o'er our couch 



ALLIE MOORE. 12 1 

Of wean- slumber, poised on snow - white wings, 

And, with thy face illumed with holy light 

And love immortal, smilest on our rest. 

We say with grosser senses thou art dead, 

For we know not the secret change in which 

Thou laid'st aside a life so low, so full 

Of pangs, and cares, and passions, such as shake 

With tumult all our stormy, fretful hearts, 

And didst assume a life so high, so pure, 

That in this sweet transition we can hold 

No converse with thee, save thro' God alone, 

Whom we may reach with prayers and supplications. 

Ay, dead! but now in death — a nobler life — 

A life above this little fretting world — 

A life above its paltry jars and hopes — 

Thou hast received that which was here denied, 

And more, an intellect of finer thought, 

Endued with subtler force than we can know. 

Thy life was gentle, Allie, but thy mind, 

Too weak, had not that strength to battle here, 

Nor yet that force which marked thy sister's growth ; 

Though now divested of all outward dross, 

I see thee sweeter than I then could know. 



122 ALLIE MOORE. 

II. 

It seems I see her still, her golden hair, 
Her eyes of summer sky, and her sweet mouth, 
An opening rose with heart of silver dew, 
That glows when, in the East, a ruddy tinge 
Gives early rumors of the coming morn. 
We loved her, but alas! she knew it not, 
Nor yet, how well, did we, till sorrow taught 
How dear her simple life was unto all. 
Nor did we understand her quiet ways, 
Her timid step, her mute and lingering look, 
And that half - doubtful flush which o'er her face 
Came when I spoke, or when I glanced at her. 
Oft when I crossed the fields at twilight tide, 
Or 'neath the red light of the rising moon 
Crossed to the trysting place beneath the elm, 
Where by the low stone wall the path divides, 
A rustling sound of garments, a light step, 
And Allie, coming swiftly o'er the mead, 
Would walk apace beside me, never speak, 
Then, ere I was aware, in silence go. 
Or when in Winter nights I took my leave 



ALLIE MOORE. 1 23 

Beneath the porch in such crisp, tingling air, 
Else, tarrying for a moment, with sweet Kate 
Beneath the scintillating stars to watch 
Them dance upon the bosom of the skies, 
And revel in the madness of their loves, 
Or brightest chosen mid the wildering host, 
Would type it to the durance of our love, — 
Then I, with last embrace and last " good night," 
Across the bridge above the creaking snow, 
With bounding pulses and heart filled with joy, 
Would haste away. But ere I reached the hedge 
That marks the farther limits of the town, 
Would Allie, well - nigh breathless, overtake — 
Her golden locks out on the frosty air — 
And bidding " good night" too, turn quickly back, 
Before my half- unconscious eyes had caught 
The vision, of her form and waving dress. 
Yet, mid the strangest of such tokens, I, 
Love -blinded wholly by her sister's worth, 
Marked not the inward hunger of her eyes. 
Nor caught the symbols of a mighty love, 
But gave them such interpretations as 



124 ALLTE MOORE. 

The irresponsible freaks of a clouded mind. 

But Allie! thou didst have an inward sight, 

That we, of coarser fabric, knew not of, 

And thou, alone, within thine own sweet breast, 

Unseen, didst nurture all the elements 

Of noble womanhood, though then they lay 

Concealed behind external artlessness, 

So foreign to the common stiff attire 

Of cold conventionalities, that we 

Hold it more than simplicity. Ah yes! 

There is an inner beauty that transcends 

By far the show of slight exteriors, 

In that within itself it is undying, 

And metes the approbation of our God, 

Who doth accord our place in the hereafter. 

III. 

The night was balmy with the breath of June, 
And summer breezes kissed the sloping hills, 
And rivulets stole thro' their banks of moss 
Down into valleys, over pebbled ways, 
Thro' greenest archery of fragrant vines 



ALL1E MOORE. 1 25 

And rushes, or in tiniest cascades 

Dashed over shelving rocks with melody, 

Into their basins, crystal clear and white, 

Then on into the river with a leap. 

The tired world slept in the arms of night, 

And in the heavens the tireless watchers kept 

A silent vigil; every weary eye, 

Save mine, was closed in slumber; every flower, 

With bended head and petals folded close, 

Wept gently for the coming of the morn; 

Deep silence sat enthroned, unbroken save 

When now and then a frightened bird, aroused 

From some dark, formless dream, a fitful thrill 

Of terror poured upon the startled air, 

Till, reassured by fledgelings' tender trills 

Of single notes, she smoothed her ruffled breast 

And then relapsed to dreaming once again. 

The little hamlet slept betwixt its hills 

That rose from off the level plain, and fell 

Away in rambling ridges to the North, 

But rounding Southward till they well nigh met; 

And each were crowned with lofty coronals 



126 ALLIE MOORE. 

Of forests, dark and dense, that slid away 
With ever thinning closeness to the base, 
And often broken by clear strips of grain, 
And cleft and ruptured by a fissure wide, 
Or cockled by depressions in the land. 
The river thro' the vale wound, cradled by 
The hills, and like a silver band stole in 
And out beneath the trailing drapery of 
The woods, that dotted all the valley like 
A summer heaven flecked with broken clouds. 
The fields lay white with dew beneath the moon 
As, harp in hand, I crept thro' clover vines, 
O'er perfumed meadows, sweet as frankincense, 
And stood beneath the window of my sweet, 
And sought with song to charm dull sleep away, 
And woo her from the rosy God's embrace. 
Above fair Dian smiled, and from the isle 
Of Cyprus Venus loosed her paphian doves, 
And ceased awhile to mourn her Adon's fate. 

SERENADE. 

On the low rim of the West hangs the moon, 
And its pallid crescent flashes far and low, 



ALLIE MOORE. t2j 

Enfolding all the earth in a silver - white cocoon, 
As it throws a pearly shuttle to and fro. 

And there are hands unseen, that are weaving from 
the sheen 
A filigree to deck our dying June. 

And there are wingecl spirits in the air, 

Bearing mystic tokens in their tiny arms, 
And they pour upon my heart, from the chalices 
they bear, 
Clear, crystal drops that hold love's sweetest 
charms ; 
And a flower -bell each rings, and they shake their 
burnish 'd wings, 
And sing thou art the fairest of the fair. 

I have waited for thee long at the gate, 

And the flowers in thy garden weep for thee : 

We have waited for thee long, and the night is 
growing late, 
And the light is fast retreating from the lea, 



128 ALLIE MOORE. 

Dost thou know that I am here ? Dost thou feel 
that I am near, 
And still beneath thy window watch and wait ? 

O cruel not to hearken to my song! 

Waiting till the dawn shall break again ; 
And, O love, our star has 'watched with me all 
night long, 
But, hopeless now, begins to pale and wane; 
And the rose within its bed, hangs with shame its 
blushing head, 
Knowing we have tarried all in vain. 

O blessings on the ever patient heart ! 

O blessings, star, upon the hope thou hast! 
Up from their mossy couch leap the roses with a 
start, 
And the perfumed air is pulsing quick and fast : 
Lightest footsteps do I hear — she is coming — she 
is near; — 
Darling, darling, art thou here at last ? 



ALLIE MOOJRE. 



I2 9 



IV. 

Oh ! happy is the summer time of youth, 
When love crowds in the heart its all of life, 
And deep, sweet joy, successive follows joy, 
As waves give chase to waves, o'erleap the goal, 
And so in mad, wild play break on the strand, 
Again — and yet again and never lost — 
Till all the heart, drunk with excessive bliss, 
Sees naught but happiness within the world, 
Nor even catches shadows of such things 
As blighting griefs, and longing, hopeless lives; 
O time of love ! art thou not beautiful ? 
Many an evening when the sunset gold 
Threw yellow beams across the prancing wave, 
And when the happy day, low in the West — 
To leave a token of returning life, 
And all the royal splendor of its noon — 
Shot one long crimson streak across the sky, 
We bent together o'er the moss - grown bridge 
To watch the waters dancing in the gleam. 
So there upon one soft fair summer's eve, 
We lingered later than had been our wont 



I30 ALL1E MOORE. 

In awkward silence, till o'er Eastern hills 
The moon, pale pilot of the stars, arose 
Up from behind the gaunt and ghostly pines, 
And dumbly steered across the azure deep 
To guide the lesser lights to other night. 
Then, breaking silence with a stronger heart, 
I claspt her hand and spoke to her of love : 
How, since I knew her first, into my life 
She had advanced, until she had become 
My life itself; until I neither knew, 
Nor felt life but in her: how I thro' all 
That length of years had never lived, but she 
Had lived for me: how she had passed into 
My very soul, and was its only light. 
I spoke with passionate utterance, and the glow 
Of that fierce flame that in me burned to love, 
Upon the altar of my idolized, 
Shone thro' my pleading eyes, and pierced into 
Her inmost soul and read its secret there, — 
She loved me! Brighter grew the burning stars, 
And softer airs blew o'er the teeming meads, 
And sweeter music fell upon the night 



ALL1E MOORE. 131 

From off the throbbing bosom of the waves, 

And quivered to the fullness of our joy, 

That like quintessence dashed thro' every vein, — 

The milk and honey, oil and wine of life, — 

The pure elixir that the heart may drink 

Once in a lifetime, once, and once alone. 

O how a moment in a life may change 

The tone and tenor of its future years ! 

So Kate, dear girl ! gave promise we should wed, 

When Autumn's lays are of the coming year, 

And fruit falls ripe, in merry harvest time. 

She spoke with faltering voice, and low, sweet words, 

And flusht like northern sunset, hid her face 

Upon the proud and happy breast of him, 

Who heard life's music centered in love's sphere — 

The passion - flood of song, whose minstrels are 

The full-fledged hopes that summer in the heart. 

We startled turned — close by a moan of pain, 

And thro' dividing boughs of hawthorn hedge, 

With pallid face saw Allie move away. 

Then first we knew her presence — she had heard — 

And first I learned the secret of her love. 



132 ALLIE MOORK 

V. 

Those joyous months rolPd onward like a dream, 
Till golden August, with its crowd of light, 
Closed in with azure skies and foamy clouds. 
Then slowly Allie seemed to fade away, 
And, day by day, less sprightly grew her step, 
And silent grew the song-birds in her heart, 
While on her cheeks the roses died away, 
And there the lily ever wax'd more pale. 
Once, on some slight pretext, at gray of dawn, 
I passed our trysting place, and 'neath the elm, 
With face bright as an angel's, pure and fair, 
And eyes turned upwards to the reddening skies, 
Saw Allie kneeling with hands claspt in prayer, 
And saw the moving lips, yet heard no words. 
And once thereafter I, at noontide, passed 
Again the hoary elm, and seated there, 
Twining a chaplet of wild roses, white 
And red, was Allie; each transparent cheek 
Had caught a pink flush from the gaudier flowers 
She held within her hands, and wholly fair, 
And altogether beautiful she sat, 



ALLIE MOORE. 1 33 

Unconscious of my presence. I drew nigh, 
But ere I had disclosed approach, she sang, 
In voice of quavering melody, sweet and low, 
This orison, with meek significance, 
And wrought the wreath of roses as she sung : 



Oh I waste my life in sighing 

For a sweeter day ; 
Gloomy clouds above are flying, 
Withered roses thick are lying 

Round my dreary way; 
Give, O give me respite, Father, 

Help me, God, I pray. 

Teach me, teach me to be lowly, 

Let me learn of Thee; 
Guide me, guide me, Thou art holy, 
Wisdom cometh — O how slowly ! — 

Slowly unto me. 
Thou alone canst teach me, Father, 

Teach me how to be. 



134 ALLIE MOORE.- 

Teach me, God, to bear all crosses 

Spirit - calm and meek ; 
Purge my heart of all its drosses, 
Give me strength to bear all losses — 

Strength for I am weak. 
Leave me not alone, Father, 

For the shore is bleak. 

O my poor soul, wouldst thou try all 
Sweets pure life may give ? 

Teach thyself large self-denial — 

Take up gladly each new trial, 
So the saint -like live. 

What am I without Thee, Father? 
Unto Thee I cleave. 

I felt a nameless choking sorrow rise, 

A heavy stifling something in my heart, 

Akin to pity, yet not pity's self, 

That for the time o'ershadowed all my joy, 

And as the last low note dropt from her lips, 

I crept away like a base, guilty thing. 






ALLIE MOORE. 1 35 

VI. 

Once when the apples on the orchard boughs 

Unclaspt their tender fingers from the twig, 

And hurrying to the long green sward beneath, 

Nestled their rosy cheeks on its soft breast, 

Came Allie craving, in her child - like way, 

Of us to go with her across the fields, 

And we, to humor her, gave glad assent. 

So when her feeble strength had spent its force, 

We sat down in the shade of a great oak, 

Myself upon her right, Kate on her left. 

So seated there, and paler than was wont, 

Her hands claspt in our own, she talk'd of death 

So tenderly, so gently that we wept. 

But when the hazy Autumn days, in mist 

White as the gauze that drapes the form of death, 

Beshrouded all of Summer's dying life, 

And nigher brought the day when we should wed, 

Lest, ere the white - bell lilies on the mead 

Should shake their blossoms in the soft Spring air, 

She should have passed beyond our earthly call 

Unto that vale where reigns forever love, 



136 ALLIE MOORE. 

Where mourning ceaseth, and the weary rest, — 

We sauntered forth with Allie once again, 

OeV fallen leaves of yellow, red, and gold, 

And fleck'd with gayest pigments, here and there, 

In careless concord, by a hidden touch — 

The first forerunners of the year's decay. 

We sought the thicket where the black -brow'd hill 

Bowl'd deepest to the river's inward swing 

To gather ripened nuts; and far below, 

Saw dimly thro' the misty blue at work 

The harvesters bind into tawny sheaves 

The bearded grain, and heard their gleeful songs 

Creep faintly o'er the foreland to the hill, 

And with expiring effort, leap the space 

To smite with gentle melody our ears. 

Then Allie spoke again of coming death, 

And of the one sweet day when she should die; 

And yet she did not speak as Allie Moore, 

But as if all those powers of her mind 

Which had lain dormant thro' her brief young life, 

And veiled in mist, had rent at last the cloud, 

And reason had asserted right and sway. 



ALLIE MOORE. 1 37 

She said that she should live to see us wed 
And happy, then should die — she was prepared — 
Ay, long'd for death to fill her void of life; 
Nor was it hard to die so she could know 
That she should meet and greet us once again. 
Then thus entreated us to live pure lives, 
That we might meet her in that other home : 
" Oh ! work not all for self, for ye are but, 
Amid the mighty herds that people earth, 
iVs grains of sand within a desert wide, 
Or as one drop within a shoreless sea \ 
So, centered in yourselves, lose keener joys 
That come unto the heart that worketh good, 
And wholly miss the goal for which ye strive — 
Your name and memory's perpetuity, 
Thro' the vast works accomplished in your lives. 
Nor think ye that none others save yourselves 
Should live as ye, or rear too high your heads, 
For we are all alike, both flesh and blood, 
And none is better than his brother is. 
The sceptered thing that on the dais sits, 
And sways the rod of empire o'er a world, 



1$$ ALL1E MOOliE. 

And stretches forth a jewelled hand that slaves 
May with humility and reverence kiss, 
Commend their will to loyal servitude, 
And bow with genuflections at his feet, — 
Can boast himself not better than are they : 
For 'neath the crown is but a sightless skull, 
And common with the dust of those who kneel 
And court a smile, or shudder at a frown. 
And 'neath the purple robe there beats a heart, 
In prison walls of flesh and sinew, that 
Owns not of redder blood than throbs in hearts 
Of peasantry, or dances thro' their veins: 
For the same worm that fattens on the hind 
Shall sate its appetite on kingly gore. 
But God hath made us to one general form, 
So each should render unto each with love, 
That all may live with equal gifts of good, 
Believing, 'As ye do it unto one 
Of least of these, ye do it unto me,' 
Or likewise, 'Charity suffereth long and is kind.' 
Ah ! what might be the end of such an age, 
When men from infancy are taught to love — 



ALLIE MOORE. 1 39 

Not love — not love, but worship dollars as 
Their Heaven or their Christ ? The cent and cent 
Beat in upon the brain, till the whole round 
Of life were but an aim and energy 
To reap and hoard up wealth, as focd for lust; — 
For not true worth now moves the world's great 

heart, 
But yellow dust that heaps the coffers full. 
But pray for strength to overcome yourselves, 
And overcome the evils of this earth, 
And watch thine every action, word, and thought, 
Both day and night, and guard yourselves against 
Besetting sins wrapt in a life of crime; 
Nor grieve the spirit which hath given ye life, 
So when ye hear the tramp of the white horse 
Swift bearing his pale rider on your track, 
Ye him may meet with calmness and a smile, 
And go with God down thro' the valley's gloom. 
Ay ? live so at the City's golden gates, 
Where dwelleth Christ eternal mid the flowers 
That strew the shining streets of Paradise, 
I may, full robed and crowned, the portals ope 



140 allieMoobM. 

To lead ye to our great and gracious Judge, 

And plead and plead for ye at his right hand." 

Here ended she, and with a last request 

That we should lay her body 'neath the elm, 

Close by the copse — our ancient trysting place — 

Should plant in Spring - time a few flowers there, 

And come together on long summer eves 

To sit beside her grave for company; 

That she should ne'er be from us far away, 

But sleeping, waking, ever over us, 

And ever near, regardful of our weal; 

That she had made a simple verse to write 

Upon the little headstone at her grave — 

Oh would we ? and we, weeping, promised all. 

VII. 

Those bright brief days fled onward filled with love, 

That threw a mellow halo over all, 

And in the mad, sweet joy of those short hours 

All was forgotten save our own wild love. 

Nay, we had come to look with pity down 

On others that they could not feel as we, 



ALLIE MOORE. 141 

And knew not of such bliss as filled our hearts. 

So, like sweet music ran the golden sands 

That counted off the moments of our lives, 

Yet all unheeded, for we knew no time, 

Till once, o'er Eastern hills, the blushing morn 

Announced the advent of our marriage day. 

Then to the altar and the white - haired priest 

I led my purer life, a happy bride, 

And heard a sweet voice plight its faith, " I do," 

To hold, and love, and cherish until death; 

Then heard the man of God pronounce us one 

In intonation tremulous and deep; 

And, Those whom God hath joined together, let 

Xo man asunder put. Like one entranced, 

Or as one in a dream, I heard, and saw 

A hundred pink and ruby colors, from 

The tall stained windows, fall with mellow light 

Upon the snow - white hair and lifted brow, 

So calm, so holy, as the old priest pray'd; 

And o'er us saw sweet Jesus carved in stone, 

With meek and patient face, and arms outspread. 

As if invoking blessing on our lives; 



142 ALL1E MOORK 

Then heard the benediction, and the deep 
"Amen " breathed like a benison on all, 
And an eternal covenant between 
Our father Christ and us; then slowly passed 
Down the long aisle amid the wedding train, 
And clouds of drapery, and fragrant wreaths 
Of roses, lilies, and of orange bloom; 
And heard the organ peal the bridal march, 
Swell on the air, and then in echoes die; 
Then rang the joyous wedding bells that told 
The happy union of two kindred hearts, 
And of the perfect consummation of 
Our love in sweet connubial happiness. 
But ah ! we did not know the bitter pain, 
The deep, dull, hopeless anguish of one heart 
That beat amid that throng of festal guests; 
Such anguish as shuts light from out the soul, 
And joy and hope forever from the years, 
Fiercer, stronger in the heart that strives 
With meek and hopeless patience to bear all, 
And uncomplainingly take up its cross. 
But Allie knew, though she betrayed it not. 



ALLIE MOORE. 1 43 

VIII. 

So came the day and Kate and I were wed, 

And merrily went the happy days away. 

But now in frequent haunts we missed a form, 

Beloved by all, and missed a well-known voice 

In mellow music thro' the darkened halls, 

And missed a central sun, a light of eyes, 

And sounds of flitting footsteps, soft and low : 

For Allie hovered nigh to the dark stream, 

Close in the shadow of another world, 

And on her brow she bore a coronet 

Set there by angel ministers, the wage 

Of a pure life, immortal, fadeless, bright; 

Yet o'er it Death had set his signet there, 

And ghastly, cold, and ever visible, 

The sign and seal of coming dissolution. 

So, day by day, w r e sought with tireless care, 

And never - ending patience, to prolong 

Her stay among us for one little day, 

A little time, that we might claim her yet. 

The scene drew near its closing; ever nigh, 

My w T ife and I sat with her watching her, 



144 ALLIE MOORE. 

Desirous each in each to comfort her, 

To light her thro' the valley with our love, 

And so dispel the gloom from that dark realm 

Thro 1 which she needs must journey to the goal 

Of higher love, and life illimitable. 

Our grief had softened down the fiercer glow 

Our passion had wrought in us, rounding out 

Our life to fuller beauty in the type, 

The perfect type of life and womanhood, 

So set before us, but to pass so soon. 

We knew now from the signs the time was come, 

And, weeping, sat beside her while she slept. 

She wakened, smiled, and spoke, " I'm going n'ow, 

But ere I cross beyond the dim blue line, 

Oh hear me, hear me, for I love you both! 

My sister, brother, wife and spouse, oh live 

Forever linkt to ends of noble deeds, 

And in. each other grow to higher things; 

Be perfect, each in each, and whole in one ; 

Move in a sphere encompassed by a love 

Drawing each day your souls in closer bonds, 

And yet each day expanding in all good ; 



ALLIE MOORE. 145 

Narrowing and yet widening self to self; 

And in each one grace your respective spheres, 

Yet so united both in other that 

Be either 'reft of other ye become 

So incomplete ye lose your higher selves. 

Nor yet can ye attain unto such ends 

Within a day, but thro' successive years, 

x\nd in probation, cares, experience, 

And in the thousand little ills of life 

And grievous disappointments, learn to lean 

Upon each other, look to each for strength, 

And so confide, and live, and love, and bear, 

The offspring of your union, perfect good. 

Oh ! in your marriage implicate the plan 

And best designs and highest schemes of God, 

And tho' your path of life be not of flowers, 

Yet let your feet together press the thorns 

And briars of a life not wholly blank 

Of sunshine, till ye do together break 

Them down, and find your bruises, pangs and pains, 

Not wholly void of balm thro' your blent lives, 

So firmly welded in a love entire; 



146 ALLIE MOORE. 

While both your purer natures thrive and grow, 
Nurtured upon the manna of sweet faith, 
And the high hopes born of a perfect trust. 
Walk girt with holy kindness; let your lives 
Be lives of charity, that ye receive 
The same in fullest measure as ye gave. 
And should ye find a lack in either self, 
Strive with zeal summ'd completest of your powers 
To fill the breach, and satisfy the want, 
And bridge the fault with the sweet scented flowers 
Of pure affection, puissant as pure. 
Nor yet live in yourselves, so that in self 
To self ye do become all of the world, 
But widen in daily processes of good, 
And grow in a true estimate of worth. 
Go hand in hand, and heart in heart, thro* life, 
And battle for the common good of men, 
And, being one, together ye shall grow, 
Thro' the great purpose manifest in each, 
In wisdom and beatitude of soul." 
She ceased; we grasped her hand and would have 
spoke, 



ALLIE MO ORE. 147 

But choking sobs kept down all utterance. 

"No; no! be not grief stricken though I go, 

The way is not all gloomy, or so dark, 

But that I see beyond the sullen stream, 

Thro' mist and shadow, sunnier slopes and lawns, 

And wings, and snowy robes, and harps, and flowers, 

And crowns, and radiant beings, such as ye 

Can have no fit conception : still I do, 

As yet, but see imperfectly, and I feel 

That all will be as brighter, reaching there, 

As now I see it fairer than this world. 

And I do go with comfort, and a hope 

I cherish guides me onward with a torch, 

A beacon nigh as clear as God's great love, 

And holding upward to the other world, 

And far above her head, a star aigrette, 

She points to ye and smiles, a sign I know — 

That we shall meet and know and love again." 

Oh! hast thou ever stood beside the couch 

Whereon lay dying one whom thou didst love, 

And seen the pale face paler grow in that 

Embrace which is of death, and 'neath thy hand 



148 ALLTE MOORE. 

Felt moisture gather on the icy brow, 

And seen two tender lips grow cold and white. 

And two bright eyes grow dull and blank in death ? 

Oh, felt a hand close death - lockt over thine, 

And watched a dear form stiffen rigidly, 

Till at the last a shudder, a long gasp, 

A gentle tremor thro' the damp lax hair, 

And naught hath lain before thee but a clod ? 

We stood beside our dying Allie's couch, 

In that oppressive silence which proclaims 

The presence of the shadowy guest, and heard 

Naught but anon a fluttering, tremulous sigh 

From those dear lips that ever whiter grew, 

And the great clock that pulsed and hammer'd off 

The counted seconds of her waning life. 

The stars in heaven set, the moon withdrew, 
And o'er the life - dial of the dying girl 
The shadows crept. 

Now lower in the glass 
The golden sands slipt dowward — deeper dusk. 



ALLIE MO ORE. 149 

She woke, and upward threw her arms and smiled, 

And murmured, " Father, take me, lo ! I come." 

The East was ruddy : rose the yellow sun, 

And dipt the valley in a golden light : 

The guest, and she for whom he tarried, passed : 

We heard them not : the gentle soul had flown. 

IX. 

And gazing thenceward now, in calmer days, 

What followed seems a dark disjointed dream, 

Shattered and sundered of the living will, 

Whereat my helpless being drifted o'er 

A scarcely conscious tide of sullen grief, 

Suckling a nameless anguish at my heart, 

That left my violet visions of summer love 

A primrose joy, destroyed by early frost. 

And now, tho' faintly, still, I think, I hold 

A dim remembrance of a shrouded form, 

A solemn cavalcade, a funeral car, 

A crowd of curious faces, indistinct 

And wholly intangible, seen thro' the mist 

Of a past grief, a white - robed priest — ah yes ! 



150 ALLIE MO ORE. 

The white - robed, gray -haired priest of other days, 

Before whose sacred shrine I pledged my troth 

To faithfully keep a dear life until death — 

And spoken words of comfort, or such words 

As should have taught sweet comfort in distress, 

But such as fell upon unhearing ears, 

Or, if half heard, convey'd discordant sense, 

Save this, that in the splendor of its hope 

Burst gloriously upon me with such force, 

That it will follow me until I die: 

" Do ye have simple trust; yea, live in faith, 

For so ye shall made heirs unto life 

Eternal; and the ties asunder torn 

In this low life shall, in the fuller day 

That followeth this night of storm and grief, 

Be once again entire, and kith and kin 

In glad re - unison sing with one voice 

Celestial anthems, praising Christ the Son; 

And ye shall dwell on hills of endless day, 

If ye but journey with fraternal love, 

A talisman within your breast, to guard 

Ye o'er the weary waste and wild of life, 






allie Moore 151 

Unto the pearly gates of ceaseless morn. 
And when ye knock and the archangel asks, 
" Who be ye ?" and ye answer, " It is I, 

open; I am weary and would rest," 

The pond'rous portals shall backward swing, and ye 
Be welcomed with one peal of loud acclaim, 
That from the court to outer wall shall roll 
Reverberant, again and yet again, 
And friends shall clasp ye, bind your toil - worn feet, 
Put songs upon your lips, bring harp and crown, 
And clothe ye in white raiment evermore." 

1 heard, tho' still my soul was dark within; 
I nursed a nameless grief, deep as unknown, 
Nor yet divine the cause, which rests with God. 
But now the spell is broke and I am freed, 
Yet still I cannot know of my own heart; 

She, on whose shrine I poured out my best love, 
Thro' selfish grief of mine, had known neglect, 
And I had well nigh blighted two young lives. 
But now the spell is broke, and in my heart 
I've folded closer that sweet love of her's, 
And so amend the past. Abideth there 



152 ALLIE MOOltB. 

A carrier dove of hope — a messenger 

That bears the olive and the palm 'twixt one 

In Heaven, and the mortal upon earth. 

The spell is broke. It came upon the time 

When mating birds build nests, and blossoms shoot 

From bud and briar, and the south - wind brings, 

Drowsed with perfume of spice from Indian isles, 

A balm to heal the wounds of Winter's wrath. 

The night was far spent, and I stood and gazed 

Upon the . unquiet heavens, till the stars — * 

The handful of bright jewels from the throne 

Of God upgathered by an angel's hand 

And strewn upon the skies — had dropt behind 

A veil of ether, and were quenched by day. 

And then in doubt, and fear, and gloom I stood, 

Till bright - eyed Phoebus o'er the dewy hills 

Roll'd upward in his golden chariot, 

And with him brought the rosy infant, morn. 

Then came new hope, and when the stir of life 

Foretold a wakening in the marts of men, 

Came action in my veins revivified, 

That many months had lain suspended quite. 



ALL1E MOORE I 53 

So I gazed out upon the growing life, 

Or watched the curling vapors of the morn 

Go upward like peace - offerings to the skies 

And saw far in the East the morning star 

Glow like young hope. A peace fell on my soul, 

And palpably a newer life awoke 

Within my troubled heart, as sweet as new. 

I feel — I know 'twixt Heaven and ourselves 

There is an angel intercedes for us, 

And guards our lives. 'Tis well. So may we live, 

That thro' the grace of God and his vast love 

We may again rest in the smiles of her, 

Who passed hence, catching from the aureole 

That cinctures the white throne a radiance 

Shall guide us thro' the night to endless day. 



a 



154 A TR1BVTK. 



A TRIBUTE. 

Ye stately powers that wait on noble deeds, 

And wreathe the laurel round the victor's brow — 
Ye that do hallow glory's fullest meeds, 

Tho' born in war, or 'neath the olive bough 
Nurtured in quietude to crown their sire, 

Descend with rhythm to stir a common zeal, 
And fan to as quick a flame our dying fire, 

As burned in those who perished for our weal. 

How soft the scene, the distant hills how fair ! 

The warble of young birds in nesting time 
Has caught the burden, and a tenderer air 

Is wafted o'er the fields from that rich clime, 
Where fell our heroes when the death - rain fell. 

And thunders shook the heavens, and the flash 
Of red artillery and hurtling hell 

Rode thro' the air, amid an awful clash 



A TRIBUTE. I55 

Of arms, and deathful shrieks, and cries, and groans. 

Then crimson life - blood stained the pulsing sods, 
And hearts had ceased to beat, or only moans 

With piteous wails rose to the God of Gods, 
Or low with agony upon the air, 

From some poor mortal wounded unto death; 
Or faintly rose from paling lips a prayer, 

Ere yet had passed forever the fleet breath. 

But turn away unto this sweeter scene, 

Tho 1 melancholy. But we hold it well — 
Nay holy, that when hill and mead are green, 

Ye flowers should bring to tell w r hat ye would tell, 
In that, words failing, flowers alone express 

The language of your hearts. The very sod 
We love where rest our heroes, and we bless 

Thro' them our Country, and all Nations' God. 

Bless that dear flag 'neath which our loved ones 
fought, 
And bless them who preserved it to our arms ! 



156 A TRIBUTE. 

Its folds from Christ's own aureole have caught 
A radiance, and a thousand lesser charms 

Caught from the skies and prisoned in its stars, 
Or spread along immaculate fields of blue: 

Still all our own, and still thro' jealous wars, 
The token of young Freedom, ever new. 

O martyr'd sons of Liberty ! ye sleep 

With deep and dreamless sleep, as sleep the brave; 
And o'er ye now with flowers we come to weep, 

And strew them, wet with tears, upon each grave 
That holds your precious dust : in love we come, 

With tributes gathered from the lap of Spring, 
And dumbly on your graves we place the dumb 

Sweet flowers, the fittest emblems we might bring. 



DISAPPOINTMENT, 157 



DISAPPOINTMENT. 

Ah well ! there is no heart but holds 

Some buried cause to weep ; 
O'er Hope's dead form what countless souls 

Their tearful vigils keep ! 

The glow of noon goes out in night, 

And pleasure dies in pain ; 
The flowers fade ere Autumn's light 

Hath kissed the russet plain. 

The shadow cometh after shine, 

Day is not fair for aye ; — 
The leaves are brightest on the vine 

Before they fade away. 

O spirit, hush ! for after rain 

The bow gleams thro' the cloud; 

And in the heart, Hope leaps again 
Immortal from her shroud. 



158 THE OLD ST OR t. 



THE OLD STORY. 

The rivulet went sobbing by, 

We saw eve's red sun glow, 
The lazy herds were browsing nigh, 

The village slept below. 

Above the ivy twined a wreath, 

In many a graceful fold, 
And moss and daisies made beneath 

A carpet green and gold. 

We parted there — I heard you sigh, 
I heard each whispered vow; 

I saw the tear steal from your eye, 
I saw your clouded brow. 

You said your heart was breaking, yet 
You strove to smile thro' tears, 

And vow'd your troth would ne'er forget, 
But cherish thro' life's years. 



TEE OLD ST OB T. 1 5 9 

O fickle tears ! O faithless vows ! 

O-fond delusive trust! 
Love weeping goes with hidden brows, 

And wings low in the dust. 



160 PRO MEMORIA. 



PRO MEMORIA. 

Yes, rake the dead leaves up; a cumbrous mass; 
Rake clean, and then set fire to the pile. 
But hold! first cull and gather from the heap 
The loveliest, the brightest, and the best, 
Prepare them carefully against decay, 
And make them in a garland, hang them up, 
Remembrancers of the dead Summer gone. 
'Twill be refreshing, when the dreary snow 
Shrouds the white corse of earth, to see those things 
On which the genial summer sunshine shone, 
And ripened into beauty, as they were. 
Moreover they will be the fittest sign 
And earnest of great Nature's covenant — 
That she will come again from out the south 
With summer at her feet, and in her arms 
The flowers that she scatters o'er the land. 
So bear the dead hopes to their winter graves, 
And cover them with years, and o'er each mound 



PRO MEMORIA. l6l 

Place the white tablet of eternity. 

Yet wait ! first gather up the beautiful, 

The gayest and the airiest, first dead; 

Secure them from the withering hand of Time, 

And in the inmost chamber of the heart ' 

Place them in secret, that your soul may go 

And often weep o'er each still form alone. 

'Twill be sad solace when the frost of time 

Hath silvered all the brow, and from the cheek 

Cropt youth's red rose and spread gray ashes there. 

But they shall be a token of that youth 

That Time can take not from us, neither Death, 

But ever and forever, hand in hand, 

With Faith, which is the sweeter name of Hope, 

Tread Eden's happy valleys, for as yet 

We have of Hope's espousal but her pledge, 

But there she shall be oar's forever — wed. 



1 6 2 THE MEET IN G. 



THE MEETING. 

We met; long years had intervened 

Since we parted; 
Each one to have grown graver seemed, 

And sad hearted. 

Each gazed into the other's face, 

Tears filled our eyes; 
We knew how oft in that same place, 

With glad surprise 

We'd stood when we more careless were, 

In happy yore; 
And then he sadly spoke of her 

We'd loved before. 

We both were friends, and each had loved 
The same sweet maid; 



The meeting. i 6$ 

Yet each the truth of other proved, 
For neither stayed, 

But without hope, tho' many fears, 

Far, far away 
We both had sail'd : and after years, 

On this sad day, 

As elder friends, had met again 

With old - time love ; 
For each had placed, thro' care and pain, 

His hope above. 

To old familiar haunts we strolled ; 

In other days 
We had been there; but we controlled 

Our wayward gaze, 

And to one spot we riveted 

Our truant eyes — 
To a low mound. We love the dead, 

And tears would rise. 



1 64 THE MEETING. 

We lingered lqng o'er that lone grave, 

And planted flowers; 
And 'neath the willows that o'er it wave, 

We sat for hours, 

Until the red sun in the West 

Withdrew from sight, 
And Luna rose with her pale crest, 

And shed her light 

O'er that sad scene, subdued and soft. 

The flowers hung 
Their heads and sweetly slept. Aloft, 

With silent tongue, 

A bird fluttered within its nest. 

Alas, bereft 
Of her pure love ! From where she rests 

We sadly left. 



CONFESSION. 165 



CONFESSION. 

I did not know I loved so well, 

As thus to start a tear; 
My foolish heart refused to tell 

Me thou wert half so dear ; 
As though ashamed to thus confess, 

It throbs still wilder yet — 
Abashed, it seeks in sore distress 

To hide, and love forget. 

O yet, my darling, thro' the years 

Since thou and I first met, 
In storms or sunshine, hope or fears, 

I knew no vain regret; 
Since, loving thee, hath unto me 

Been born a tender trust, 
So, tremblingly, I bend my knee 

And tell thee, for I must. 



1 66 AN A UTUMN SCENE. 



AN AUTUMN SCENE. 

The leaves are yellow, brown, and red, 

The wind howls dismally thro' the wood, 
Flowers are dying, some are dead, 

And dreary is the solitude; 
Dark leaden clouds sweep o'er the sky — 

The distant hills are seared and bare — 
Fruits in the fields decaying lie, 

And chill and damp is all the air. 

The rabbit seeks with cautious tread 

His covert in some distant vale; 
The lowing cattle homeward thread 

Their narrow way in twilight pale. 
The woodland's arches echo far 

The rustic herdsman's merry tone; 
Far in the distant North a star, 

One solitary, gleams alone. 



AN A UTUMN S CENE. 1 6 7 

The sun behind the distant hills 

In glowing colors sinks from sight, 
One loitering bird a " good - night " trills, 

And twilight deepens into night. 
O'er all the river, deep and wide, 

A mist hangs heavy in the air; 
The lonely fishers onward guide 

Their little barks with quiet care. 

In deepening gloom, the ruddy light 

From lowly homes shoots thro' the dark, 
And, streaming forth, the veil of night 

Is pierced and rent in twain. But hark ! 
And silently approach and gaze 

Upon the love that here is spent, 
And see how God in humble ways 

Doth teach mankind to be content : 

Within, around, where joys reside, 

Are heard deep, heartfelt thanks for peace; 

Though luxuries should be denied, 
They are content, nor wish increase : 



1 6 8 AN A TJTUMN 8 CENE, 

Each rustic, with' an honest pride, 
Disdains for riches to aspire, 

Well pleased in comfort to abide, 
Nor cares for more to glut desire. 



TO THE ATHEIST. 1 69 



TO THE ATHEIST. 

Out on the shameless heresy of the times ! 

Ah Christ, the cankerous spirits of these years, 

That eat with slow malignity the truths — 

The vital truths on which thrive all true souls, 

And on which hangs the sweet hope of our lives - 

A higher world, a purer life to come! 

What are these poisonous worms infesting earth, 

That perforate and eat the moral world 

To weakness, till society doth fail, 

And, 'reft of a true base on which to build, 

Falls back into the ancient pagan groove, 

Relapsing slowly into barbarism ? 

O tell me, are these such as who would work 

Their fellow creatures everlasting good ? 

O God, tear out the lying tongue that breathes 

Foul lies into the ever ready ear, 

And vitiates the purest character 

Of moral truth : crush out the filthy heart, 



170 TO THE ATHEIST. 

Reeking and smoking with the fumes of crime 

And blackest evil, rotting with unbelief, 

And nursing darkest forms of atheism ! 

Scorch with white heat of truth the working brain, 

That plots and conjures 'gainst thy living Word, 

Glutting its informed appetence of sin 

In ruining the souls of fellow men ; 

Base pauper - minds, that gain their nourishment 

From off the putrid carcasses of hearts 

Killed by their damning, vile callidity, / 

Hooting patristic courage to the mob 

With sneers, and cries, and oaths, and blasphemy, 

Distaining whitest robes, defiling souls, 

And whipping with their tongues all good from men. 

O God, strike down the disbelieving hand 

Raised upward by the infidel to smite 

To death thy Word, thy living Word, that works 

And measures all its good unto the world. 

No God ! no God ! when every flower that blooms 

Breathes Christ on every hand ? No God ! no God ! 

When every wind that blows brings heraldings 

Of an Immanuel ? Is there no Christ, 



TO THE ATHEIST. 1 7 I 

When every sea is thundering up to Heaven, 

"Hail! hail! ye mighty Ruler of the Storms?" 

Go list where the gigantic cataract 

Pours down the precipice its seething floods, 

That laugh at puny powers of microcosm, 

And hear of Him who scoopt and hollow'd out 

The solid rocks, built up its compact walls, 

And by a slightest movement, or a thought 

Of that high mind forecasting great events, 

Shuts up the bellowing flood - gates of its wrath. 

O atheist, whoe'er ye be, go out 

Into the shades of forests, there commune 

With Christ thro' His best works — the breathing leaf, 

The blade of grass, the bud, the flower, the bee, 

The humming insects, birds, and browsing herds, 

Nature inanimate and animate, 

And learn that all save thee proclaim of God, 

Existing offsprings of His power and hand. 

Go look, at night, upon the quiet stars — 

Fair things of His creation — things that stretch 

Beyond the outgoings of thy little mind, 

And know that God is in them — they are His, 



172 TO THE A THEIST. 

And move in their ellipses to His will. 

Say, canst thou comprehend them ? dost thou know 

That they are planets, stars, or peopled worlds ? 

Of what avail is all thy boasted skill, 

Thy subtleness of insight, brought to test 

Before the chemic work of Nature's laws — 

The substrate will, that starts the leaf from bud ? 

Hast thou not, when the heavens shook their rime 

Thick over the dead earth, held in thy hands 

A million tiny star -formed crystal flakes, 

Nor wondered, then, within thine inmost heart, 

Who with such beauty and such cunning gave 

A shape to each in such diversity ? 

Hast thou not underneath the rubric glow 

Of summer sunsets, dasht thro' purple clouds, 

Seen God's face shining thro' each feathery fold, 

Nor wondered longer, then, nor doubted more, 

But knew our Christ above in hue and sky? 

Ah, what avails our logic, O my soul ! 

For even as I write dark doubts arise, 

That wait like beggars at a palace gate, 

And thrust their hateful presence on me, till 



TO THE ATHEIST. 1 73 

I lose the trustful spirit of my dream. 

God, O Father, teach me what thou art; 

Remove all forms of doubting and distrust, 

And guide me, Christ, into thy sacred light, 

Me, thy poor child benighted on the way, 

And weary, footsore, crying for thy help. 

Save, save, O God ! in Thee alone is strength 

To break the stubborn will of my vile heart, 

To level down the barriers of pride, 

And crush the sophist spirit of my mind; 

The dull, cold intellectuality, 

That ever questions, ever finds a flaw 

In every dogma be it ne'er so true; 

Nor anchors hope in sweet and simple faith, 

But frets o'er deeper tides of unbelief. 

To Thee, great God, we are mere effigies, 

Moving, yet prompted by no will of self, 

But puppets acting to the invisible touch 

Of secret hands. Without Thee we were dead 

To action, petting a numb life within 

The cloggy brain, devoid of finer sense 

And keener vision, making man the man, 



174 T0 THE ATHEIST. 

And lifting him above the plane of beasts. 

And God, we ever try to catch of Thee 

A sense that gives Thee to us as Thou art, 

Yet ever failing, thro' a din of thought 

And blent confusions of the intellect. 

Like readers running o'er the hurried page 

With eyes intent, and yet with inane mind 

To catch the meaning shrined within the words, 

And, inadvertent to the will, it takes 

Full rein and ranges, bit in teeth, in a 

Far distance, absent from the ordered words 

The eye pursues again and still again, 

Yet ever losing in inanity 

The callid thought, until the tired brain 

Is called unto itself by sheer fatigue; 

Until the words that fell like jargon, hard 

And stiff and meaningless, in a full burst 

Of light and reason shape themselves to truth, 

In all the beauty of their symmetry : 

So, blinded by this sluggish clod of earth, 

Our wits run well nigh daft thro' sophistry, 

And vanity of reason, argument, 



TO THE ATHEIST. 175 

And what not ? while our clearer inner eye, 
Thro' all this fog and mist, doth ever strive 
To read the high and mighty Infinite; 
Yet ever doth elude the Pearl of Truth 
When nighest grasping, till our aching souls 
And weary, worn, returning on themselves, 
Lay down this weight of ashes and vile dust, 
When, in a burst of splendor, cometh truth, 
And, freed from darkness, comes immortal light, 
And come in Christ true strength and sweetest rest; 
Ay, thus a calm! O soul, and what are we? 
But moving, living, speaking thoughts of God, 
Cast for a time upon a desolate shore, 
Waiting recall unto the parent mind. 



1 7 6 WASHING TON'S MR Till) A Y. 



WASHINGTON'S BIRTHDAY. 

February lid, 1875. 

Once on this day was ushered into life, 

And first drew breath, one of the first of men, 

The best, the greatest, and of truest soul, 

And mightiest benefactor of mankind. 

When Liberty was thrown into the lurch, 

And Freedom groaned beneath Oppression's heel, 

He rose, and with a firm hand graspt the reins 

That guide this pond'rous governmental car, 

And with keen judgment, and unerring eye, 

Came safely thro' a slough and mire of blood, 

And safely to the post of victory. 

How shall we do meet honor to his name, 

Render fit tribute to his memory? — ■ 

He who bore thro' such great* vicissitudes 

A life as spotless as the winter snow. 

Pay tribute, all ye high souls of to - day ! 

Lay down oblations at one common shrine, 



WASHING TON'S B1R TED A Y. 1JJ 

And on one common altar lay your meeds; 

What are the wages of such priceless worth, 

If not the homage of high kindred souls ? 

His was the record of a purer life, 

A nobler character, a meeker soul. 

Than now we find in those who, on the stand 

Reared in self- righteousness, proclaim themselves 

As pure beyond the general caste of men, 

And as of extraordinary worth ; — 

Than those who, in stentorian voices, shriek 

Out, Here am I, a pure and honest man; 

Come, littler souls, and take example here 

Of virtue, such as ye have never known. 

Of such he was not; innate in his breast, 

He bore and fostered such a spirit there, 

As would admit no sycophantry — mean, 

Base underlying veins of venom, that 

Throw poison on the vitals of the soul, 

And show themselves in acts of dastardy; — ■ 

Nor harbored cavil to gain little ends, 

Foul thoughts, that only spring from fouler hearts, 

But wore the signet of a sweeter life, 

H 



I 7 8 WASHING TON'S BIR THDA F. 

And on his brow a coronet of thought, 

Such as dwelt in the mind of him alone — 

Bright jewels, that shone brighter for the gloom 

That wrapt the age wherein he moved and worked. 

What mean the baseless outcries of the times ? 

Preachers that give not practice to their faith ? 

Precepts with the slightest grain of truth, 

But in the main vile chaff and worthless weeds ? 

What mean these mock - reformers and their creeds, 

Whooping from every corner of the streets 

Their shameless cretism, drowning Truth's sweet 

voice, 
And rooting out a century - rooted faith, 
Tested and tried by long experience, 
And found to hold wealth of immortal truth. 
Strange times ! when men must overturn all law 
To sate a morbid thirst for something new, 
Or gratify a lust of power or gold, 
Renounce the certain faith of ages back, 
And, o'er this vast sea of eternity, 
Let go the sure rock of the law divine 
And catch at random bubbles as they pass. 



WASHING TONS BIB THDA T. I 7 9 

But higher than all sophists — shameless herd! — 

The simplest peasant is, who, in his heart, 

Bears true belief and simple faith in God, 

And 'lights upon that finer inner sense, 

Unto which is evolved the ampler truths 

And surer light in His omnipotence. 

So he, of whom I speak, held in his heart 

A simple faith that put to flight all doubt, 

All sophistry, and ever bore him up 

To those high things for which he was ordained. 

So how shall we do honor to his name, 

Render tit tribute to his memory ? — 

He who bore thro' such great vicissitudes 

A life as spotless as the winter snow. 

Pay tribute all ye high souls of to - day ! 

Lay down oblations at one common shrine, 

And on one common altar lay your meeds; 

What are the wages of such priceless worth, 

If not the homage of high kindred souls ? 



l8o THE COMING DAY. 



THE COMING DAY. 

Behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look 
upon the fields, for the)' are white already to harvest. — 
St. John, 4:35. 

O sunniest of lovely sunny days ! 

O magic memory of that fair time, 
When June's rich roses jewelled the green ways, 

And brooklets leapt thro' fields of purple thyme ; 
Again I hear thro* lightly dancing leaves 

Voluptuous webs of melody, enwrought 
On harps whereon sad ^Eolus sweetly grieves, 

From sunset climes by errant Zephyrs brought. 

Night drew her mantle from the sleeping world, 
Each lusty herald wound his morning horn, 

The mists up from the rivers bosom curl'd, 
And, in his golden chariot of the morn, 



THE C MING DA T. lSl 

Young Phoebus gathered o'er the glowing hills 
The shining dews, and robed his argent zone 

With glittering splendor, and caught from the rills 
Their million gleams, as jewels for his throne. 

Rathe violets, the first that Spring had given, 

Lay withered in the gloom of quiet nooks; 
But their sweet sisters, from the blue of heaven 

That glassed itself in silent pools and brooks, 
Had caught a reflex, and above the dead 

Bent sighingly, and in the morn, in ruth, 
A dewey azure tear upon them shed — 

Fair promisers that perished in their youth. 

The south winds over fragrant meadows brought 

A scent of clover - blossoms, sweet with June, 
And twinkling voices in the air upcaught 

The burthen of the rivulet's gentle tune, 
Harmoniously commingled with the fine 

Clear tones the lilies - of- the - valley made 
Stirred by a wind -breath, and Life's ruby wine 

Leapt up the soul and Joy's mad hests obey'd. 



1 8 2 THE COMING DA Y. 

The pensile perfume of the locust - blossoms 

In showers dropt down upon the slumbrous air, 
And wanton Eros, on the panting bosoms 

Of passion - flowers, dallied with the fair 
Unveiled charms, till with delight's sweet stress 

He sank into luxurious repose ; 
And sleepy paeonies blusht at a caress 

Bestowed with fervor of a wayward rose. 

Such the full time I read those old traditions, 

And mystic legends of the Orient — 
Those wild and wondrous Indian superstitions, 

The fanciful and fabulous vaguely blent : 
How Bhogirath and Vishnu out of heaven 

Persuaded Gunga to descend with force, 
That the infernal regions might be riven, 

And Sogor's sons freed, that his fabled horse 

Be found whose sacrifice alone could place 
Him on the throne of Indra, Heaven's king. 

Ah ! yet in each strange myth I only trace 
The innate restlessness, and hungering 






THE COM 1X0 DAY. 1 83 

Of minds that strive to grasp the Infinite — 
Of minds that seek to sound the unfathomable 

And reach the Supreme Author, but whose light 
Is clouded, and heart's vision dim and dull. 

Up from the past, throughout a weird glory 

Of cloudy mists, on Memory's wings upborne, 
Arose the fragments of an olden story 

And slowly gathered form, as, overworn, 
Day drops behind the western hills and dies, 

And Night comes creeping on, and summons round 
Her starry retinue, and from the skies 

Strews all her vapory treasures o'er the ground. 

And as strikes on the lotos - eater's soul 

A melancholy vision from afar, 
Bearing sad music o'er dun seas that roll 

From distant shores, unto the evening star 
Waning far off upon an unknown coast, 

And myriad mournful voices, grieving low. 
Until the vision in dreary void is lost — 

Came o'er me that grim talc of sin and woe, 



184 THE COMING DAY. 

The outcome of an awful pagan creed, 

Till all my heart was filled with dark unrest; 
And mid that gorgeous summer's wealth, the need 

And poverty of countless souls were prest 
Upon me, with sin's dreadful afterdoom. 

"O God," I cried, if we thy favored sons 
Be thine indeed, shall we not from the gloom 

Of Hell lift up thy hapless, famishing ones ?" 

O ye who dwell to - day in Christian lands, 

Who bear the Christ - like in the human heart, 
Extend in sympathy your kindly hands, 

And fold in pity those whose lots apart 
Were darkly cast in Fortune's sterner mould, 

But who, still hidden in the heart's recess, 
Keep bright the spark divine, and who still hold, 

Mid darkness, on their brows God's high impress. 

The heathen they are human, and they bear 
As much of Heaven's divinity as we : — 

Give us leal hands and hearts to do and dare, 
O God, and that sweet patience, that we be 



TUE COMING DAY. 1 85 

Strong workers in Thy vineyard — tHat who engage 
Shall, hand in hand, move on to that rich goal, 

Thy sweet Millenium, Thy Golden Age 
Of wisdom, virtue, and the larger soul. 

O faithful ones, lift up a voice in prayer! 

Ye of the vanguard, gird the armor on ! 
The call to battle rings upon the air; 

And God awaits beside the great White Throne 
To welcome home His weary ones and brave : 

Doubt not, keep heart, nor faint upon the way, 
But yonder where the battle banners wave 

Press onward, and lead in Christ's Coming Day. 

Hark ! hear ye not upon that distant shore 

The billows gather — break — and dash again ? 
And growing on the ear, from more to more, 

An interrupted anthem, and a strain 
Of heavenly choristers about the Throne: 

An empty barge rocks idly in the bay 
With idle oars, and Charon is alone ; — 

God welcomes home His laborers to - day. 



1 86 DENIAL. 



DENIAL. 



Little fingers writhe in anguish, 

Stream with tears the wide blue eyes, 

Cherub lips are pursed with passion, 
Baby - breast heaves angry sighs. 

Nut-brown hair tost wildly backward, 
Streaming ringlets side by side, 

Mute the heart with baby sorrow — 
Still a kind word is denied. 



Little hands are gently folded, 
Meekly dark blue eyes repose, 

Cherub lips, so sweetly tender, 
Like a rose-bud, softly close. 

One fond heart beats there in anguish, 
Lingers long at baby's side; — 

" Oh ! too late, my heart is breaking, 
And a kind word I denied." 



mil ton; 187 



MILTON. 

A thing of wondrous genius, yet a man ! 

A man of mortal passions, mortal wants, — 

A man of pleasures, hopes, and little griefs 

Like unto our's; but unto whom, of man 

The nature was an open page, and life 

Was but one great apocalypse. To whom 

The earth was but a treasure house of vast 

Proportions, and who call'd its secrets, one 

By one, from out their darksome crypts, and form'd 

Them to his will. The seas to him, and all 

Their varied life, were but another great 

And mystic revelation, and he heard 

Within their softest murmurs love - words sweet, 

And in their howling storms a voice of might. 

In every flower, and every shrub, he found 

A speech, and every waving leaflet spoke 

To him in a divine, mysterious tongue 

He understood alone. He made him friends 



1 88 MIL f on. 

Of brooks, and birds, and rocks, and hills, and woods, 
And nature's grand arcana were his joys. 
The golden sun and silvery moon were his, 
And in the twinkling stars learned precepts there. 
He was not of those minds who cannot hold 
Resolve more than a moment, but thro* years 
Pursued a steadfast plan to consummation; 
Nor touched upon a theme that loftiest minds 
Scarce dared contemplate, but he freely dwelt 
In Heavens of beauty, and in Hells of terror, 
Where lesser minds had lost themselves in space, 
Or wildered moved with powers to think benumb'd. 
Ere darkness on the windows of his soul 
Fell and forever shut the light' without, 
He doted on the things of nature most 
He saw around in wealth on every hand, 
And in the blue of heaven saw signs of peace, 
And in each rolling cloud was charity. 
But when to him these were forever veiled, 
He dwelt in that large light he held within, 
And with the mystic things of life communed, 
Dwelling with those vast beings of his brain, 



MILTON. 189 

And holding converse with the hoary past. 
He knew not of a common joy or grief, 
But his sunk deeper in the soul and found 
A record in the hidden archives of 
His life. Him none could fathom, and he lived 
Alone, and had his pains and pleasures all 
Alone; for his existence owned a large 
And wider realm than of the common herd. 
He did not altogether live upon 
The earth, but here, and there, and otherwhere : 
Whole constellations claimed him, and he made 
Home in Orion, and the many worlds. 
He moved within the cycles of the stars, 
And made upon the milky way his couch, 
There lying down to dream of mightier worlds, 
He bade his spirit flee from zone to zone, 
And to the limits of the world, or pierce 
The ice-lockt regions of the either pole. 
All things convey'd a meaning unto him, 
And doctrines found within a blade of grass, 
Or in a broken twig sublimest truths. 



190 THE ROSELEA&. 



THE ROSELEAF. 

When Beauty with her magic wand, 

Toucht thee, budding, thro' and thro', 
A lovelier robe by thee was donn'd 

Than e'er Belphoebe knew. 
The sunshine kiss'd each ruby lip, 

And caused a pink blush to o'erspread 
Thy perfect features, where did drip 

The dews that dyed them deeper red. 
But low thou liest, now, in dust, 

To happier roses but a scorn, 
A puppet to each passing gust, 

Made fellow of by lowlier born. 
O sweet decay ! O fitting type 

Of beauty from its standard hurl'd — 
Of grace discrown'd by a too ripe, 

Voluptuous day in this low world; 
And, disenthron'd, kick'd with a curse 

By grosser to a lower plane, 
Vile envy ne'er will reimburse 

The prodigal, ignore the stain. 



BY THE CORSE OF A FRIEND. 191 



BY THE CORSE OF A FRIEND. 

And this the world calls death, this quiet sleep, 

That placid face, the beauty of that smile ! 

The white hands folded o'er the pulseless heart, 

And the meek closing of each waxen lid, 

Alone proclaim the sweetness of her rest. 

O slumber on ! no cares now, quiet one, 

Shall e'er disturb the calm of that chill brow. 

Or pale those marble cheeks; they passed with death: 

Nor shall the cruel world's ungentle hand 

Sweep o'er the tender chords of thy still breast, 

For they are dumb, ay, dumb forevermore ! 

And this was once that being frail, yclept 

Man in his vanity ! Yon cold abode 

Of clay was once the habitation of 

The sorrows, joys, ambition and dispair, 

The same as rack this living bosom now ! 

O there in yonder tenantless abode, 

Man's awful prototype inanimate ! 



I92 BY THE G0B8E OF A FRIEND. 

I see in yonder dull and sightless orbs, 

Yon nerveless limbs, yon mansion reft of soul, 

The dreadful forecast of what yet shall be. 

Draw near, ye mortal, gaze upon that brow, 

Upon those frozen lips yet wreathed in smiles, 

And on that snowy breast in calm repose ; 

Approach! — canst thou behold death's terrors, say? 

Behold its beauties then ; — dost fear death now ? 

A fragile shroud, a winding sheet, a deep 

And narrow cell is at the close of life 

The heritage of all. Ah, hustled by 

The living to the tomb lest, dead, perchance 

He dumbly mock our works ! Yes, hastened on, 

Lest by decay, suggestive, he should mar 

Our little day — too thorny — not too brief. 

Of those fine particles struck off from God 

By God himself, man's godly element, 

He had full complement; and life with him 

Was not a whereby to reach sordid ends, 

But a vast mean to higher accomplishments. 

O perished fullness of sweet charity ! 

O lovely life quenched in the shades of death! 



BY THE CORSE OF A FRIEND 193 

Alas, that every way we follow here, 

Or base, or noble, ends but in the tomb ! 

conquerer grave, and sullen, wrapt in gloom, 
What art thou unto man — to boastful man ? 
Thou art alike the universal bosom 

Of the fond mother, whereon lies at rest, 

Rough - pillow'd, sleeping babes ; the goal where 

youth's 
Ambition needs must find an end, and where 
The weary pilgrimage of man doth cease; 
An associate constant of us all, and like 
Mankind bereft of quickening soul, a horror. 
Bright earth ! hereon we dwell existent beings ; 
This glorious framework of the mind and body 
Sprung not by chance from chaos, but grew up 
Beneath a hand omnipotent — God's hand. 
And what that far - off end we are to meet ? 
The aim and object of creation what ? 

1 cannot think that we were made to pass 
To utter nothingness — to be cast out 
After a brief time of sublimity, 

Back into chaos — vast annihilation. 



194 B Y THE CORSE OF A FEIEND. 

God first breathed into us the breath of life — 

His breath — and God can never die. The mind 

Is mighty, prisoned round with dross of dust — 

Confines of flesh — oh, wondrous edifice ! 

But in the grave this structure must decay, 

And its divine inhabitant, so freed, 

Divested of its fetters, ranges freely — 

Flies back, an atom, to its parent bulk, 

Merging therein, and ever lessening more, 

And ever growing, makes the perfect whole. 

Dear, silent one, thou art, at last, at rest ; 

On thee shall press no sculptured tomb, o'er thee 

No lofty mausoleum shall in pomp 

Adorn thy grave. Alone shall virtue mark 

With speechless tongue thy couch of holy sleep. 



A MEMORIAL. 



195 



A MEMORIAL. 

I stood beside the bier of the dead boy, 

And watched the sunlight o'er his features play, 

And kiss the sunken cheeks and the pale brow. 

Without, the birds sang a sweet requiem, 

And flowers were nodding, and the grass was green, 

With the first hues of Spring. A light breeze crept 

Thro' the half closed shutters, laden with 

The hum of insects and the scent of flowers, 

And laid a gentle touch upon a few 

Stray locks of the wan sleeper. He had been 

During his illness a great sufferer, 

But bore all with a meek and holy patience, 

Till death, when Spring had brought her wealth of 

joy, 
And buds were bursting on the tuneful trees. 
Had loosed the bonds and set the prisoner free. 
We followed him to the last resting place 
Of mortals, and saw the quick turf heaved aside, 



196 A MEMOBIAL. 

And sprays of evergreen and fragrant flowers 

Placed round his narrow dwelling. It is well. 

Now lay the dear boy down, and gently press 

The velvet sods above the slumberer. 

"Ashes to ashes, dust to dust." Bring flowers, 

And strew rose - garlands and Spring violets, 

And lilies - of- the - valley on his tomb. 

Sing no sad requiem, but let a song 

Of love and piety go up to God, 

And waft the angel on his heavenward flight. 

O weeping friends, be comforted ! Not ye 

The less are blest that he has passed from sin, 

And stands, full - robed, amid a radiant host 

With harp and crown, and praises on his lips. 

O ye who weep to-day be comforted! 

He liveth now and looketh down with love, 

Or yet, unseen, abideth with ye still. 

O could the lips of immortality 

Frame words to reach the ears of mortals here, 

How sweet the hope that ye would cherish thro' 

The words of love that he would utter ye : — 

" Do ye have simple trust, that thither we 



A HE UO RIAL. 



[ 9 7 



May meet again with love in sunnier realms, 

And summer *o/er on the hills of myrrh, 

In endless happiness and holiness, 

Thro' Christ's love, and beatitude of soul." 

Have hope. He lives, and every summer, breeze 

Brings to ye a rich largess of his love 

And influence, unseen tho' palpable. 

And when of balmy eves ye go where rest 

His ashes in a husht repose, and gaze 

Upon the emerald mound, or mournfully strew 

Memorials of flowers o'er his grave, 

Go with a tender pleasure, that ye know 

He is not there but risen, and again 

Upon your bosoms he shall rest in love. 



198 A LOVE SONG. 



A LOVE SONG. 

Dear Love ! I know my heart is stirr'd 

By that sweet life I catch from thee, 
I know my inmost soul hath heard 

Thy spirit's gentle melody; 
Such showers of calm — such rays of peace, 

Thro' thee have fallen on my heart, 
I know its happy throbs would cease, 

With thine, if death should bid us part. 

As balmy dew, at twilight - tide, ' 

Falls on each flower's panting breast, 
Thy spirit into mine doth glide 

And bringeth with it perfect rest. 
The splendor of thy dreamy eyes 

Fills all my vision with delight — 
An azure as of tropic skies — 

The shadows of a summer's night. 



A LOVE SONG. 1 99 

The contour of each rich ripe lip 

Suggests a ruby - hearted rose, 
Whereof Apollo - cherubs sip 

A dewy nectar, as it flows 
Atween them on ambrosial breath, 

That in itself is life to twain ; 
My brow in fulgence thou dost wreathe 

With love -stars, brighter than the Wain. 

And aye Love wears a vernal glow, 

And buds of hope that into bloom 
Will start and burgeon, and will grow 

In beauty with divine perfume; 
And shed a fragrance over years, 

That else had been a barren growth, 
Devoid of all save woe and tears — 

A desert waste in hearts of both. 

I hold a dear hand in mine own, 

There, warm and white, it nestling lies, 

I catch the music of love's tone, 

The sunshine of love's soft bright eyes; 



200 A LOVE SONG 

I know — I feel thou 'rt all, all mine, 

In tenderness and beauty rife; 
A world to me, a joy divine, 

My more than all, and life in life. 

Soon will the songs of birds be fled, 

And soon the latest flowers will die, 
But when youth's summer hours are sped, 

And gathering clouds gloom Autumn's sky, 
We will not mourn the fledgelings flown, 

The fallen leaves, nor empty nest, 
But side by side we'll lay us down 

And fold our hands and take our rest. 



EPITHAL AMIUM. 



EPITHALAMIUM. 

To Rev. Dr. and Mrs. H. 

The golden wheels of five - and - twenty years 

Have roll'd you to your marriage day again, 
When standing on the beach, thro' happy tears 

You gazed out o'er the fair and tranquil main, 
Then claspt and shot your shallop from the bay. 

We know, we know life is not always fair, 
But hearts that love reach thro' the darkest day, 

And catch thro' gloom the sweet relief of prayer. 

True love thro' years grows dearer, is not lost, 

But groweth in the heart forevermore ; 
And most we love when grief environs most, 

With joy far purer than e'er felt before; 
It waneth not, but waxeth in the heart 

To such full vigor that it holds the soul 
Forever holy, and it cannot part, 

For there is that admits of no control 



202 EPITHALAMIUM, 

darling friends, how happy is your store ! 
How much of bitterness you may have known 

1 cannot tell, for sorrow will creep o'er 
The heaven of every soul, but not alone 

Has sorrow held your hearts; that larger light 
That cometh after darkness is your own, 

But all your souls are glowing warm and bright 
With leading Christ's lost lambs to His white 
throne. 

Go on, oh noble hearts, in these sweet ways, 

O bring His wandering children to the fold ; 
No higher labor crowns your hallowed days, 

And somewhere there awaits you wealth untold, 
In God's high realm, with illimitable love, 

And countless souls shall witness of ye there, 
And, angel - throated, shall attest above, 

Of your unwearying labor, faith, and care. 



O golden day, depart, but come again! 

Go, hut leave blessings for the dear ones here; 



EPITHALAMIUM. 203 

Come never bringing sombre grief and pain, 
For all too often falls the mournful tear, 

But come with smiles, and sunny laden hands ! 
Walk on, sweet friends, down that long valley - 
road, 

Where love shall light thro' gloom to other lands, 
And pave your way to Heaven and to God. 



2 04 A M ON LIGHT REVERIE. 



A MOONLIGHT REVERIE. 

I love to sit, at night, when the pale moon 
Broods o'er the earth, a messenger of peace, 
And in the solemn silence of that hour 
Hold deep communion with my inner self, 
And with the secrets of my inmost life. 
The dusky face of night is better known 
To me than that of man, and is by far 
A more congenial friend; for in its gloom 
I trace no simulation masked in light, 
No guile or fond duplicity as in man, 
No foul deceits fair aspects cover o'er, 
But honesty and a clear rectitude, 
And truth and candor clad in dark disguise. 
For unto one who dwells in nature's love, 
And bears within his breast the mystic key 
That opes her secret archives, one and all ; — 
To one who bursts this chrysalid of sin, 






A MOONLIGHT BEYERIE. 205 

This crust of crime, this worldly unconcern, 
And into vaster realms and ampler light 
Emerges to the palm of victory, 
A keener sense, diviner truths are brought, 
And errant feet are led in purer paths. 
Sometimes in darker hours I have thought 
That some were made to ever be alone, 
And bear their sorrows in themselves alone, 
Finding no sympathy in fellow men. 
Perchance there 's bitterness within my soul, 
For this world has not used me wholly well, 
And every heart doth hold within itself 
An unknown sacred history of its own. 
Upon this earth is gross injustice done, 
And all do suffer it to some extent; 
Yet I am not a misanthrope, for in 
The woe of others comes a woe to me, 
And in their joy I feel my deepest joy. 
But thou, O lovely moon, art unto me 
A friend, an humble, faithful, gentle friend. 
Meekness in thee and loveliness do vie; 
Tranquility within thy charmed sphere 



2o6 A MOONLIGHT 71EVER1E. 

Sits thron'd, and in thy mellow light is peace : 
Unlike the sun, persistent thou art not, 
But on the circles of the earth thy light 
Doth fall, not with an eagerness, but thou 
Dost win thy way into the hearts of all 
By gentleness, and by thy pleasant smiles. 
And I have come to look upon thee and 
The night, as fondly as a mother on 
Her only child; thy tenderness doth with 
The tenor of my mind accord, and best 
Doth soothe its morbid irritancy; for it 
Hath sore been wounded by an unkind world, 
And now from further harshness it doth shrink. 
And this, in under guise, perchance the world 
Would call self- adulation and conceit, 
Since highest souls must suffer keenliest; 
But no, 'tis not, for nature made me thus, 
And who would, then, impute unto me blame ? 
Ay, who ? for foremost I have ever held, 
Be what thou seem'st, nor thy true self conceal. 
There are those whose whole life's devotion is 
To work all evil 'neath a friendly mask, 



A MOONLIGHT REVERIE. 207 

And blinding flattery and oily words ; 

Yet none can wholly prison in himself, 

Or wholly hide, the baseness of the heart, 

For the outcroppings of a little soul 

Will sometime break thro' finest coat of mail, 

However deftly it be wrought to show 

A polished courtesy and civil air. 

The hydra -headed monster, Slander, doth 

Put forth a new head when the old is dipt, 

And sucking dry the noblest fountains of 

His life, will never let its victim die. 

Nor can he hide from a too vulgar gaze, 

For with a vulture -eye the jealous world 

Doth ever for a new oblation watch 

To offer unto Mammon's petty god, 

Or downward drag the youthful aspirant, 

But part way up the height he would attain, 

To hurl him down the steeps of failure's hell, 

And sink him in oblivion evermore; 

Or to its own foul level gyve him down, 

And with its vileness tainting him, adopt 

And mould him subject to its loathsome will; 



208 A MOONLIGHT REVERIE. 

Wrapt in its selfishness it chafes to learn 

That upon earth a nobler worker is, 

With truth and honesty within his breast, 

And for his tenet, Good will unto all: 

But with an envy born of littleness, 

It seeks to crush the stately spirit out. 

Like Momus, on the heights of ridicule, 

It sits and marks the toiler on his way, 

And with a scornful finger points him out, 

Cries down the splendid fire of his heart, 

And shoves him to the multitude below, 

Where the vile mob howls at a man when down. 

Or " damn'd by a faint praise," ambition's spark 

Is smothered by a confidence depressed, 

And in a shattered wreck is genius left 

A " mute, inglorious Milton " thro' all time, 

Alas ! these transitory gusts of fame, 

What are they ? hollow mockeries, random sparks 

Cast upward, but to die out in a breath. 

And what avail ovations unto man, 

Paid by the mass, less unto the true worth 

Than to the fame the multitude accords, 



A MOONLIGHT REVERIE. 209 

When in that gloomy hour the throbbing heart 

Neglects to beat, and the life - giving breath 

Comes in quick gasps, or leaves its dwelling quite, — 

When o'er the heavy eyes thick darkness falls, 

And o'er the chilly flesh the sweat of death 

Creeps, and the frame is rent with agony 

And mighty anguish, as the struggling soul 

Beats 'gainst its prison bars to be set free; — 

Of what avail ? Not easier is the couch 

Of death to him, who in his healthful prime 

Graspt at that golden bubble, man's applause, 

And caught it ere it burst into fine air. 

Why should we fret our little lives away, 

In vain endeavors to immortalize 

Our names in this base world, so when our hearts 

Shall back to dust have crumbled, we may live 

Still in the bookstalls, in the marts of men, 

The subject of low bickerings, wordy blows 

In petty strifes, negotiated o'er, 

And bought and sold as common ware, or, sales 

Unfruitful proven, thrown aside, as chaff, 

And suffered to die in oblivion ? 



2 1 A MO ONLIGHT REVERIE. 

No! rather let us strive for sweeter meed, 

For richer gains, for fuller wages, that 

Shall reach thro' these brief years, out -live the stars, 

And buy a high place in eternity. 

This land of mortal life is but a step 

Above the river and the vale of death, 

Where gloomy shadows and damp vapors are, 

But on the opposite shore celestial heights 

Of Paradise rise up in freer air, 

And sweeter light — the promised land of God. 

And we may reach it with these surer guides, — 

These perfect beacons shining thro' the gloom — 

A perfect faith that ever leads aright, 

Continuous endeavor, useful lives. 



KATIE LEIGH. 21 1 



KATIE LEIGH. 

I met, one summer's morning, 

When dew lay on the grass, 
Sweet Katie of the meadows, 

A pretty, winsome lass. 
And I had soon passed Katie, 

For her eyes made me afraid, 
But she stopt me in the clover path, 

Hard by the furze - fringed glade. 

A bird sang in the hedgerow 

To its mate in the hawthorn tree, 
And there was a look in Katie's eyes,- 

A look that troubled me; 
For first they shone with merriment, 

And then lookt dark and shy, 
Till sunshine in their liquid depths 

And shadow seemed to vie. 



212 KATIE LEIGH. 

I said, "What is it, Katie?" 

And I lookt off thro' the glade. 
" My pet lamb, John, has slipt its leash, 

And to yon wood has strayed; 
I can hear the tinkle of its bell, 

But dare not venture there — " 
And a question, then, rose in her eyes 

That made her look thrice fair. 

"And you wish me to find it, Katie?" 

"Oh,- John, if you only would!" 
And nearer moved with brown hands claspt 

In eager attitude. 
"Well, wait for a few moments here," 

I said with an awkward bow, 
And yet felt something in my heart 

That made me bolder now. 

The words of the farmer's daughter, 
Or the golden streaks of the day? 

For I had long loved Katie, 
And oft in my bashful way, 



KATIE LEIGH. 21^ 

Had lingered with her at my side 

Long at the garden gate, 
With something I ever wished to say, 

Yet still I would ever wait. 

I think that Katie knew my heart, 

And knew what I would say; 
And yet when I would speak, her eyes 

Seemed ever to laugh a "nay," 
Till I had again grown timid, 

And then, as to relent, 
She always smiled such a sweet, sweet smile, 

It seemed she said " I repent." 

So thus she ever put me off 

Till two long years had fled, 
And still I bore within my heart 

Its secret yet unsaid; 
But when we met, that dewy morn, 

Where the sun shot shafts of gold, 
I saw a something in her eyes 

That made my heart grow bold. 



2T4 KATIE LEIGH. 

I vow'd, as I led the lost lamb back 

Thro' the tangled wood and vine, 
That I would speak. my love to her, 

And ask her to be mine. 
She stood by the hedge nigh the hawthorn tree, 

In the beauty of her grace, 
With the shadow still in her hazel eyes, 

And the same soft look on her face. 

" Oh, thank you, John," she said, and smiled 

A smile both warm and bright, 
And holding her hand for the hempen leash, 

I claspt it firm and tight; 
" Katie," I said, " I want to speak 

What you have known so long — 
I love you, Katie; tell me, sweet, 

Do I do my heart a wrong ? 

" For two long years I've borne my love, 

And never dared to speak — " 
And looking down, I saw a flush 

Had crept o'er either cheek; 






KATIE LEIGH. 21 5 

" Do you love me, Katie ? Speak," I said, 
" May I call this dear hand mine ?" 

With a deeper flush she hid her face, 
And whispered, " I am thine." 

So the sun never shone so goldenly down, 

And the sky was never so blue, 
And the flowers were never so bright, as we walkt 

Back over the morning dew; 
The birds never sang so sweet before, 

Such a morn I had never seen; 
And the sumac berries were never so red, 

And the grass was never so green. 

So the hare and the white -bells merrily rang, 

And the sumac fiercer burned, 
And the red rose changed to a deeper red, 

And the white rose whiter turned; 
The water-lily hung its head 

And blusht at the kiss of morn, 
And the faery wood-nymph in its glee 

Blew loud the marriage horn. 



2l6 KATIE LEIGH. 

When the leaves on the trees were rubric and gold, 

And corn hung ripe on the ear, 
When the red - cheekt apples fell from the boughs, 

And the harvest was ripe of the year; 
When aftermath had nigh its growth, 

And the fields of their wheat were shorn, 
Katie redeem'd the promise she made 

In the meadow that summer morn. 

The years have gone with a velvet tread, 

And Summer has come again, 
The birds are singing in the primrose bush, 

And daisies are white in the lane, 
The leaves are thick on the hawthorn tree, 

The corn's silk tassels wave, 
And mellow flecks of sunshine play 

In the grass on Katie's grave. 



THE BUD. 217 



THE BUD. 

Once when the young Spring opened fair, 

And mellow coo'd the mating dove, 
A lovely maid took from her hair, 
And gave me, as a sign of love, 
A little bud — an opening flower, 
And said, " Within its tender leaves 
My heart is shrined. I give it thee; 
And tho' its loveliness should flee, 
And it should fall to dust this hour, 
The heart that lies within deceives 
Thee not, nor e'er shall earthly power 

Us sever." 

So. rapt in faith, I took the flower, 
And wore it nearest to my heart — 

Frail thing! for ere that one short hour 
Had gone, it droopt and fell apart; 



2l8 THE BUD. 

It droopt, it withered, faded, died; 
I knew it not — its loveliness 

Was passed away, 'twas only dust. 
Yet still I lived within my trust, 
But, woman - like, she it belied, 

And ere the year had gone and less, 
Her love and promise were denied 

Forever. 



TO A BROOK. 



TO A BROOK. 

Flow on, O singing brook, and gently lull 

My vagrant thoughts into a sweet repose ; 

Soothe me into forgetfulness of earth, 

And into that dim, dreamy state of life, 

When, living, in our minds we cease to live, 

And in another sphere have being, but 

No more ; — when slumbrously the pulse beats, and, 

With soul in trance, we live yet know it not. 

My brain is tired and perplext, and hot 

And burning is my brow with weariness 

Of overwork, while all my thoughts still cling 

To this gross world and sad realities. 

Oft I have strayed upon thy winding banks, 

Half listening to thy sweet and crystal tones, 

Or lain me down beside thy mossy marge 

To let the frowsy tinkle of thy waves 

Drive from my soul its dead, dull weight of care : 

So, as of old, again soothe me to rest, 



220 TO A BROOK. 

And soft embraces of the rosy god. 
The southern winds blow cool life's ruby streams, 
That rush with fevered tumult thro' my veins, 
And as I dip my hands within thy flood 
And lave the drops of toil from off my brow, 
My spirit, freshened, starts from out its sloth. 
Aye flow on, O sweet wanderer, flow on ! 
For never did the balm of Gilead 
Possess one -half the virtue of thy waves. 
Flow on; perchance some other eager mortal, 
Peace - thirsty mid the dust and drouth of life, 
And weary of its strife and din, will stroll 
Along thy shore, and in thy dancing tide 
Seek healing and relief; or lying on 
Thy flowered brink, and gazing up into 
Such azure stretch of sky, the holy founts 
Of tenderness will so gush forth anew, 
And he will draw yet nearer to his God. 



APHONY. 221 



APHONY. 



I love the lays, deep, rich, and strong, 
The poets sing from a full heart, 
That cause its inmost founts to start, 

And waste themselves in one sweet song; 

Wherein do vie in friendly strife 
The best expressions of the soul, 
And which, revealing, backward roll, 

The curtains of the hidden life; 

Which give an utterance to each word 
Within us, which the still small voice 
Doth speak, as if with equipoise 

The poet's soul our own had heard — 

Heard, and from a confusion formed 
Dull fragments into perfect parts, 
Or a dead something in our hearts 

Had roused, and into life had warmed. 



222 APHONY. 

A little song, a little lay, 

Tho' to which our whole being thrills, 

And, independent of our wills, 
Calls up our griefs to die away. 

Full oft Fve vainly tried to sound 
Such art as tuned the ancient strain. 
Ay! oft have tried, yet still in vain, 

For my poor harp 'twere too profound. 

And oft, too, have I tried to wreathe 

A laurel meet to later days ; 

No crown is mine; alas! my lays 
The glorious standard sink beneath. 

Frost pictures on the window pane; 
Without, the form of Summer dead, 
From whose blanched cheek the glow hath fled, 

Which happy Spring shall call again. 

So in my heart, a winter scene 

Hath touched rny summer hopes with frost, 



APHONY. 21$ 

And withered quite, forever lost, 
Is that sweet freshness which hath been. 

For never can that Spring return 

Which gives the lost voice to my soul, 
That — that alone beyond control 

Of vernal wakening, I must mourn. 

I know not how the flowers come, 

I know not how they pass away ; 

I only know, from day to day 
The voiceful grows unto the dumb. 

O let me sing what doth remain ; 

A dying voice, a broken chord, 

The memory of a tender word, 
The echo of a far - off strain. 

What once I was I am not now; 

The freshness of the glowing morn 

In leaden day hath died forlorn, 
And Spring lies dead with frosted brow. 



224 APHONY 

The months roll on, the years decline, 
There lives no trace of what hath been ; 
Half- withered lies the wreath wherein 

The asphodel and amaranth twine. 

barren voice ! O wasted life ! 

O doubtful dreams that come to naught ! 
The stream rolls darklier onward, fraught 
With bursting bubbles, meeds of strife. 

1 know the grave will swallow up 
The memory of a frail success ; 
No memory lives in emptiness ; 

Oblivion drains the shallow cup. 

But let me pass : O what shall live 
Before the shivering shocks of years ? 
Within this hollow vale of tears 

There's naught that can endurance give. 

Tho' mine shall pass, and all shall pass, 
And leave a soundless void behind, 



APHONY. 225 

Shall thought lie fruitless in the mind, 
Or mould beneath the summer grass ? 

Far better he had ne'er been born 
Who breathes an ever idle breath, 
Or yield himself at once to death, 

Ere nature's faith be overworn. 

Tho' I have failed in larger ends, 
Nor wrought myself a fuller store 
Of men's sweet memories, more and more 

Shall death and darkness prove my friends. 

So let me die; I bear a prize 

At least of humble labor crowned, 

And changeless 'neath the changeful ground 

Shall rest till God may bid me rise. 



2 26 DISQUIET. 



DISQUIET. 

Why do I find this world so hard and cold, 

That unto others bringeth light and joy? 
Why is it that my life alone doth hold 

So much of grief, when seeming no alloy 
Is found within another's perfect bliss, 

But all the heaven of their life is fair ? 
Ah, tell me, soul, is it thou art amiss, 

Dost thou alone taste rancor and despair? 

A nameless sorrow clouds my inner sky; 

Grief's shadow coldly rests upon my heart; 
I cannot weep, but can forever sigh; 

From others I so wholly drift apart, 
Out on an unknown, shoreless, wintry sea, 

That from the world behind I only hear, 
Faintly, those louder echoes borne to me 

Of wild despair, and I pass on with fear. 



DISQUIET. 227 

Within the middle depths of silent wolds 

The nut drops sharp and clear thro' the still air; 
Anon, across the sun, with shimmering folds, - 

A cloud drifts slowly by, and takes no care 
Whither it journeys thro' the sapphire sky. 

Hither and yon the smoke of burning weeds 
Curls upward, and in marsh and hedgerow nigh 

A bobolink feasts on the ripened seeds. 

Thro' meadows brown the lazy runnels creep, 

And on the surface of the silent pool 
The still leaf floats, and where sun shadows sleep, 

The snake glides out from coverts green and cool 
To bask its freckled sides in Autumn's beams. 

The dying year rallies again to - day. 
Thro' mottled forests the far river gleams, 

And seaward passes to the distant bay. 

The leaves are falling, golden, red, and yellow; 

A slumbrous mist hangs o'er the purple hills, 
Whither the amber light sleeps warm and mellow, 

Or glimmers o'er a hundred dancing rills : 



2 25 DISQUIET. 

O nature dons her fairest robes to die in ; 

And is most beautiful when nearest death; 
Her loveliest raiment she puts on to lie in, 

And crowns herself with Autumn's richest wreath, 

O soul, why art thou sad ? the Summer dies, 

Not thou; faith whispers it shall come again, 
In newer beauty and with bluer skies, 

And sweeter flowers spread across the plain. 
But thou shalt never die — shalt never doff 

Thy vestures of proud immortality; 
Tho' seasons pass away and years fall off, 

My soul, thy life is of eternity. 



THE LEAF. 229 



THE LEAF. 

SPRING. 

A budding leaf: 

A child and childish dreams, 

Wild aspirations, little griefs and joys. 

The narrow stretch of childhood's widest ken, 

And boundless wonder at the fitful gleams 

Caught of the gains of knowledge wrought of men, 

And wisdom's garnered stores, piled sheaf on sheaf. 

An awkward pure affection is the boy's, 

Set to a bashful girlish coquetry 

Behind a gathered wimple, and shy eyes. 

A simple evening prayer at mother's knee, 

A fond " good-night," a tender kiss and warm, 

And rosy eyelids close in rosy sleep. 

The first deep sorrow by the little form 

That death hath stilled forever, and with tears 

Mix childish wonderment and vague surprise, 

When the sweet sister 'neath the ground is laid. 



230 THE LEAF. 

So grows the mind of childhood, grade by grade, 
And so fills out the measure of its years. 

SUMMER. 

A rich green leaf: 

And youth as rich and full. 

A lusty life leaps madly thro' its veins 

Onward to manhood. Not a sense is dull, 

But glows, and quivers, and with vehement strains, 

Seeks to outleap itself. True, there is grief, 

But 'tis passionate sorrow, and seeketh a passionate 

balm, 
And fervently clasps and presses close to its heart 
The fond sweet form of Pleasure, and with dear 
Warm kisses, and an ardent eloquence, 
Kneels low at Beauty's feet and offers love. 
It never can know of a calm, 
Till the cares and the sorrows of year upon year 
Have all chill'd the overwarm soul, and the dart 
Of old Time hath infused a malady into the blood, 
And the stern hard features of Care, 
And the wan white face of Despair, 



THE LEAF. 23 1 

Have banished the joy - loving guests of the spirit 

from thence. 
Youth follows the footsteps of youth 
To the end of the morning of life, 
And it will not stay by when the sadness of truth 
Casts a gloom o'er the present, but into the strife 
Of the world it will fly, tho' it lose the smile of 

the good. 
Youth is noble and weak, and foolish and wise; 
With a sympathy sometimes cast for the wrong 
Still it is generous, and ever espouses the cause 
Of the feeble oppressed by the strong. 
Youth is youth, and its blood-heat never can know 

of a pause, 
Till the clouds of time have drifted over its skies, 
And its limbs are aweary with journeys o'er profitless 

space, 
Begin to wax feeble and fail in the guerdonless race 
And the shadow of hope grows dim in its luminous 

eyes. 

AUTUMN. 

A yellow leaf: 

And manhood hale and ripe; 



232 THE LEAF. 

A golden glory nighest to its fall; 

For nature, ere the time she goes before 

Seared grass and leafless trees, 

Gathers from out the fulness of her store 

Her richest beauties, decks herself, and dies. 

Yet Autumn is the chiefest of the chief, 

Begot of cloudy and of sunny skies; 

And manhood reaps the harvest of the years, 

Growing from more to more by fine degrees, 

And garnering the experience of all. 

The richness of its gains we cannot type, 

For it is something great to be a man. 

A loyal manhood on its forehead wears 

The halo of the sunset, for it stands 

Upon creation's highest pinnacle, 

The crown of all created, catching there 

The splendor - flood of evening, or perchance 

The lustral reflex of another world. 

Who can compute the prizes it hath won ? 

Of progress it is foremost in the van, 

And while the hearts of Nations throb and swell, 

It onward presses, bearing in its hands 



THE LEAF. 233 

The meeds of honest labor, truth, and care. 
The falling shades of twilight more enhance 
Its honor, for above, serene and fair, 
The lustrous stars of ages lie empearled, 
Invisible save when the night comes on. 
Ah yes; the leaf is fairest ere its fall; 
But most we miss the bird when its sweet call 
Is silent, and the flowers when they're gone. 

WINTER. 

A withered sear brown leaf: 

A broken frail old man; 

Life passed in dreams, and hope hath fled away. 

Above, a wintry heaven, cold and gray, 

And a dead landscape round on either hand, 

And 'neath his feet the snows of years lie heapt. 

Time shreds away with fingers pale and wan 

The thin white locks, and with a plaintive grief 

The sobbing voices of the past arise 

And wail around him. Life alone hath reapt 

But phantom sheaves of perished joys, a grain 

Of winnow'd wisdom, buried love, much pain, 



234 THE LEAF 

A little slumber, and a barren prize. 

His journey now lies thro' a dreary land; 

The way is short tho', very short, and leads 

Across a misty valley, down a road 

Well beaten, rugged, and not very broad, 

To a dim door, by which lie life's poor meeds, 

Placed there by those who journey 'd here before, 

Passed thro', but could not take with them their 

store. 
A surly warden there doth watch and wait, 
And to the pilgrim opes the mystic gate, 
Who totters in, is lost, and seen no more. 
But surely, surely this is not our goal : 
The night draws on, but over all on high 
God hangs His silver lamps out in the sky, 
And God with love will light the weary soul 
Thro' all the darkness, o'er that desert way 
Where it must pass. But oh, an endless day 
Breaks on the troubled vision, and the night 
Hath left us, while around celestial light 
Falls in a radiance, purer than the gleam 
That mortals catch of Soul -land in a dream. 



THE LEAF. 235 

And there immortal youth shall be renewed; 

A ceaseless summer, an eternal June, 

In all the fullness of the wealth of noon, 

Shall rest on emerald hill - slope, mead, and grove. 

And deathless as the flowers which are strewed 

Round in supernal beauty, Love shall sway 

That spirit - empire, and endure for aye 

From crescent more to most; for God is love. 



2 $6 UNREST. 



UNREST. 

I wish my mind would waken from its dreaming, 
I'm tired of hollow visions — bootless quests ; 

I wish the world to me were else than seeming, 
And other Life and Love than phantom guests. 

I wish I saw not dust in lily - blossoms, 

Or on a maiden's brow the touch of years; 

I hate to think Time plucks from lovely bosoms 
Their early rose, or dims bright eyes with tears. 

I wish I saw not in a dainty form 

A skeleton, or ashes deadly lying; 
Or on a sweet warm lip the fretting worm, 

Or heard in sighs of love those of the dying. 

I wish the green leaf never would turn yellow, 
It seems to me the world is all decay; 

In turn each season followeth its fellow : 
The years fall on us; we are put away. 



rxi^EST. 237 

Each to his separate task goes hurrying by; 

The morning ploughman whistles to his team ; 
The flying world goes hurrying thro' the sky 

'Mid flying stars; and I, I only dream. 

I look abroad — there dreaming runs the rill; 

The listless flag dreams by the dreaming wave; 
And yonder there, across the dreaming hill, 

The amber light lies dreaming on a grave. 

I dream— and men leap on from prize to prize, 
Weaving a future on the world's great loom; 

But o'er them there I see white marble rise, 
And summer grass o'er a forgotten tomb. 



238 EVOLVTlOtt. 



EVOLUTION. 

We clomb the hill, my Cecil Lee and I ; 

We clomb the hill up slopes of fern - fring'd bowers, 

'Mid goldenrod and scarlet bittersweet, 

And stood upon the topmost spur that made 

A sombre crown for all the ridge below. 

The valley spread beneath us dipt in light; 

For from his yellow quiver, in the west, 

An half hour high above his ocean grave, 

The sun shot golden lances at our feet, 

And lit the tawny robe that Autumn folds 

Across her russet shoulders, ere she goes, 

With Summer's last few flowers, and orange leaves, 

To hide the faded beauty of her breast, 

Away, in mystic splendor. 

Then she said : 
Look yonder there, the sun is well-nigh gone; 
Earth only rests content in arms of Night. 
The fallen glory of the summer lies 



EVOLUTION. 239 

Heapt withering in the lap of the gray year. 
To me 'tis ever sad to see the leaves 
In passing beauty flutter to their graves, 
Like early hopes, that in the round of life 
Have gone before the blighting breath of time, 
And scattered o'er the landscape of the heart, 
Forget they once were lovely. 

Answering I : 
This is the season of the dying year; 
Yon is the hectic flush on Nature's cheek, 
Who dieth 'mid a threnody of woe, 
And the Destroyer's reaping now is come. 
The order is fulfilled, and each must pass 
To give place to another, that in turn 
Each cycle come and go in fruitfulness. 
Spring antedates the coming of the Fall, 
And Autumn Spring, each mutually interlinkt 
In one vast chain throughout eternity. 
Seed - time forerunneth harvest, germ the fruit, 
As childhood manhood. Life forecasteth death ; 
Death is its mean to immortality; 
Age ripens it for birth from foetus - state ; 



240 EVOLUTION. 

When the old husk is crackt, and soul from out 
Its chrysalis emergeth into light — 
The perfect embryo from the womb of time. 
Decay is stampt upon all temporal things, 
But nature meaneth resurrection. Death 
Expounds the riddle of a fuller life. 
Then she : 

Ay, but the lily withers and 
It comes again no more, and in the sky 
A star goes trembling into darkness and 
We cannot fix the place where it hath been. 
Necessity hath fettered every sense, 
And we are bound with gyves that fuse the soul; 
Tied hand and foot. Empiric freedom we 
Have not, but only theoretical : 
'Sooth we have no accountability. 
It seems to me in beauty's swift decay, 
The only thing of light on life's dark shore, 
Is presage of the nothingness of things 
Hereafter. Ah, the fallacy of faith ! 
For why should we, all summer leaves grown sear, 
Hope for a larger liberty to be, 



EVOLUTION. 241 

And fuller, beauty, shut in this low life, 
And deathless death the penalty to him 
Who waiteth not for the reprieve to come, 
That cometh mayhap never, but we die 
And senseless dust again weds senseless dust. 
'Tis only nothing has infinity : 
For that we mete, of palpability 
Unto corporeal or to spiritual sense, 
Must have initial, and in this have end 
In one direction; time is absolute; 
That is omnipotent alone which was, 
Is, and shall ever be. 

But I replied: 
What know we of ourselves of aftertime ? 
For time is finite. On the disc of life 
A crescent shadow falls, while evermore 
Mortality counts off with faltering hand 
The years, the hours, the moments as they pass. 
But we are infinite — of eternity; 
Sparks from the flame divine of God sent out, 
Bearing the deathless nature of that flame. 
But when each part as spirit to the Whole 



242 EVOLUTION. 

Shall back again be summoned, lo ! the sign ; — 

For then the grosser portion of this being, 

As dust and clay, thro' such may blossom up 

Within the myrtle, or the violet. 

Beauty's in all things; there is naught so low 

But that hath beauty in it, more or less, 

If it be studied rightly. Wrong may have 

An under beauty if good be its crown, 

For evil shares of God's economy. 

And beauty still is beauty evermore, 

Tho' we may name it as we will, subjective, 

Objective, positive or negative, 

'Tis all the same — the principle is there ; 

There is no difference but in degree. 

It is the evidence of Him alone, 

Christ manifest in nature ; for He is 

The sum of beauty, perfected in love. 

That which hath most of this hath most of God; 

But not alone may it be visible 

In the extrinsic sense, for beauty is 

The highest as of deed, of thought, of soul. 

In lives of holiness, and works of grace, 



EVOLUTION. 243 

And words of prayer, true beauty is alone. 

But charity and beauty are akin, 

When beauty is of truth ; there is none else 

Intrinsic — Three in one ; for there is more 

Of love in this, and most of God in that. 

Christ's life is the most perfect paragon 

Of beauty that we know. That of the flesh 

Is perishable — like to flower -life 

Before Autumnal frosts. But that in deed 

Is of the soul, divine, and bears direct 

Relation unto immortality. 

We have it thus : this truth is of the flower — 

'Twill wither, fail and fall, that which we see 

Of all external beauty, but in nature 

Throughout there teleologically runs 

A principle that is resuscitate. 

So it may fade, but it shall bloom again 

In treble measure, when from out the dust 

Earth calls existence in its progeny, 

And new life flourisheth up from out the seed. 

To - be rests in the things that were and are — 

The past and present. Reproduction is 



244 EVOLUTION. 

The primal law of life. The universe 

Resolves itself to cardinal elements^ 

And on the fundamental rule of love 

Leans, Atlas -like, forever. God in all 

Is complement thereof. I cannot think, 

That one thing He hath made and put in life 

Shall e'er be nullified — be cast in void, 

But all shall grow, and ever, ever grow 

From farther unto farther, more to more, 

As we from life to life, and sphere to sphere, 

Pass up from higher essence unto higher — 

From part to Unit, many into One — 

And so be lost and all absorbed in God, 

The first and last, the pure and perfect Whole. 

No, not in vain a leaf shall fall to ground, 

A flower wither, or a fly be crusht, 

But what hath passed unto a fuller end, 

In grade by grade, degree by fine degree. 

For else creation's scheme in part must fail, 

And naught become the crown of futile life, 

And immortality be lost in death. 

No action can there be without effect, 



\EVOLUTION. 245 

And cause must duly bring its consequence. 

But causes like produce a like result, 

And, since life brings result in richer life, 

Our being strikes a being correlative. 

Life otherwise were barren, and the ends 

Of things could not subserve their own beginnings, 

If from the whole great mass but here and there 

God pluck t a life to save. Yet He hath made^ 

And not the least of things of Him create 

Shall prove abortive in His grand design, 

Or fail and be of full fruition void : 

And so formation and salvation are 

His white - wing'd ministers to earth from Heaven. 

That we are nature's sum, tho' creatural, 

And so responsible, our acts do prove. 

The conscience is the dial of the soul, 

On which God tells our actions, one by one, 

And none are so abased but sometime hear 

The warning voice of Heaven's monitor. 

Th' eternal principles of right and wrong 

Must ever rule, and unpervertible. 

That being hath his liberty alone 



246 EVOLUTION. 

Who is responsible. God is a law 

Unto Himself, in an infinitude 

Of freedom and responsibility. 

On earth each soul, as soul, to Him is dear 

As is another, if thro' love it trust, 

And thro' the darkness God will lead us up 

To that divinity of beauty, caught 

From light of knowledge, which with truth -is one, 

And summ'd in Christ the beauteous Son of God. 

He lives in vain who lives not unto truth. 

To me it ever hath been holy joy 

To place my hand upon thee, Earth, and feel 

The wondrous throbbing of thy mighty heart; 

Coeval as in monads with the Spirit, 

Thou art, with all thy sister worlds around, 

Concomitant forever unto Heaven, 

And pant'st for that regenerative birth, 

When thou again shalt issue from the fire, 

Divinized to immortal loveliness. 

I think that in the marvelous Triune scheme, 

And mysteries of nature's cabala, 

There is a token, that of all the parts 



EVOLUTION. 247 

Of all the universe not one may fall 

Back into chaos, or to emptiness, 

And still Triadic nature be complete. 

We cease to breathe, and then men call us dead : 

I cannot look on childhood's rosy cheek, 

And unmarr'd brow, nor think how it must pass 

Thro' cares to manhood, sorrow unto age, 

And so to death — and immortality. 

Each generation passeth making room 

For other generations yet to come; 

But none have burst the silence of the tomb, 

Nor journey'd from the Land of the Hereafter, 

To tell us there have been souls lost or saved. 

fear - fraught spell ! the mystery of things 
Weighs down upon my spirit, like a dream 
Of horror in the dead hours of the night ! 

1 may not probe the secrets of the earth, 

Nor search the hidden lore of yon blue heaven, 
For e'en the small pale leaf that thither lies 
Is mystery, and God is more than all. 
But let us wait; we, too, shall have our day. 
The sabbath of the world is nigh at hand : 



248 EVOLUTION. 

Time 's but an atom of eternity. 

It matters little what we may believe, 

So we have faith that God is good and just, 

For we may change no tittle of His plan. 

To us in mercy veileth He His face, 

Its light to earthy eyes would strike us blind. 

Yet hear me, love, I tell thee truth, we live 

Not for the present, but the time to come": 

The greatest man to - day on all the earth 

Is he who is the best, and he as like 

May be a hind as King for aught we know. 

We are like stars, and stand alone in crowds; 

But we must give our light unto all others, 

As from another we receive that light; 

A gift is debt, and debt is gratitude. 

We in our turn shall lift the hidden veil, 

Tho' Death shall lay his finger on our lips 

And we be dumb, nor from the sepulcher 

May whisper unto mourner, or to friend, 

" Be comforted, for all with us is well." 

But see! the sun hath passed beyond the line, 

And like a monk's cowl round the brow of Earth, 

Night rests upon yon valley: let us go. 



SONG. 249 



SONG. 

In the good old time agone, love, 

Than you were none more fair, 
And life to us alone, love, 

Brought dainties rich and rare. 
Your eyes were sunny blue, love, 

And snowy white your brow; 
And your dear heart beat true, love, 

As truly then, as now. 

But to me you are dearer, love, 

Tho' not as then so fair; 
You unto me are nearer, love, 

For the silver in your hair. 
And oh, 'tis many many years 

Since, love, on that sad day, 
We first went out and knelt with tears 

Where our dead baby lay. 



2 SO SONG. 

But now there are three little graves 

Where three dead babies lie, 
And the first summer daisy waves - 

O'er the last that we laid by. 
Now, darling, we are closlier bound 

By angels crown'd for aye ; 
So come, and by each little mound 

Let us go kneel and pray. 



TO ERATO. 251 



TO ERATO. 

There are eyes in my heart that are stars in the 
gloaming, 
There 's a voice that is music thro' bower and 
hall; 
'Mid gardens of flowers a fair form is roaming, 
And lightest of footsteps, dearer than all. 

There's a splendor of loveliness caught from the 
sheen 

Of a grace that is noon -light in twilight and dusk; 
And thro* my heart's world, o'er a memory serene, 

Is blown the sw r eet fragrance of roses and musk. 

In a temple of light, by a vestal is tended, 

With myrrh and frankincense, an altar to Love, 

And the perfume with odor of spikenard is blended, 
And in wreaths of white vapor is wafted above, 

To the rhythmus of melody, gentle and low, 
Thro' arches of crystal and fret - work divine ; 



252 TO ERATO. 

And all take a tinge from the sunrays that flow 
Thro' windows of colors of purple and wine. 

All, all are the mystic and magic creations 
I owe to the touch of a passion sublime, 

Wherein, intermingled in closest relations, 
Thy form is the fairest and sweetest of time. 

Tho' beauty thro' years should all mantles be doffing, 

Tho' the eye, and the lip, and the cheek, are but 

dust, 

May no gloom in our sky, and no rock in the 

offing. 

Dim the stars of affection, or wreck a sweet trust. 

What tho' the grave be the goal of all mortals! 

What tho' the night should succeed the fair day! 
Do we not catch thro' the heavenly portals 

The dawn of a morn that is morning for aye ? 

So thro' thee I bear a great hope for the future, 
A trust that is crescent, a star in the night, 

A bud that will burgeon, O love, if thou nurture, 
And foster my flower till it blossom in light. 



WAITING. 253 



WAITING. 



'Tis not that life hath wholly unto me 
Been joyless, or I've lackt the ministry 
Of loving hands and warm and tender hearts, 
Or that across the brief but dreary waste 
No green oasis lies, with cool sweet springs 
Of pure affection, or my journey hath 
Been void of words of comfort and of cheer, 
And good Samaritans to bind the wounds 
Of hatred, or to pluck the thorns of grief, — 
But that my heart is bow'd before its time, 
And all my soul is sick and spirit faint. 
As on a tree a few sad, lifeless leaves 
Toss from the restless boughs, before the first 
Wild sentinel - storm that ushers Winter in, 
And howls the pale and ghostly Autumn out, 
So from the withered branches of my life 
Flutter a few dead hopes, before the blast 
That comes with blight from out the sepulcher, 
That lies begond the wintry sea of death. 
And sweeps with desolation round the heart 



254 WAITING. 

But oh, in swaddling bands of faith, 1 nurse 
Close at my breast a sweeter trust than all 
And deathless, for, despairing, I have knelt 
Oft in the passion and the power of prayer, 
And felt in heart Christ's gentle creed of love. 
O soul ! for thee a happy dawn shall break 
O'er Eden's hills, and crown'd with fuller life, 
Shalt summer ever in the smiles of God, 
And join the white - wing'd choristers in praise. 
But ah, heart bides the coming of that dawn, 
Like a wan watcher by a sick man's couch, 
Or a fretful child that babbles in his dreams. 
Methinks I catch tho', o'er the weary time 
That links the present with my dying hour, 
A song of angel - voices, whose refrain 
Is, " Wait a little, wait a little, now, 
Ev'n now the Shepherd seeks thee thro' the night." 
Still, evermore I long for that sweet time 
When I may lay life's burdens down, and wrap 
The cool dark mantle of the earth about me,, 
And turn to my long rest. God's will be done; 
But I am weary, weary and would go. 



.4 DEDICATION. 255 



A DEDICATION. 

To Rev. S. P. G. 

Dear friend ! of soundest mind and purest heart, 

Accept this humble tribute to thy worth, 

And to the gracious zeal thou bear'st in good, 

From one who, in such measure as he can, 

Bears witness to a loyalty of grace 

In stately deeds and chastity of purpose, 

And noble aims in sweet philanthropy. 

To thee may every blessing Heaven affords 

Descend in Christ - love to requite thy faith, 

And bring in waning years a calm of soul, 

Such vast serenity of mind and heart, 

That thou shalt know thy labors have been blest! 

And in thee I have found a duplex self — 

Tho' still the sweeter nature is in thee — 

My better being I have drawn from thee, 

That, losing thee, I lose my higher self. 



256 A DEDICATION. 

Thro' thee my life hath ta'en a manlier strength, 

My heart a purer pulse, my mind a tone 

So high it scorns the missiles envy hurls 

With petty malice, and derisive jeers, 

And in a simple trust that thou hast taught 

I place a sweet hope for eternity. 

Go, arm in arm, with Faith o'er this rough world, 

And so aye and forever down the slope 

Of that long hill into the Vale of Death, 

A comfort each to each, and common love 

A torch to light and guide ye thro' the gloom. 

Walk on in thy great mission, garner souls 

Into the mighty granary of the Lord, 

And Christ's own hands shall pleach a laurel crown, 

O'er -studded with the gems of His great love, 

And place it thus immortal on your brow — 

The wage of worth as He alone can measure. 



HYMN FOB CHRISTMAS EVE. 257 



HYMN FOR CHRISTMAS EVE. 

This is the night that Christ was born; — 

The Earth, forgetting not the day, 
When sang the happy stars of morn 
Together sweetly, long ago, 
And in the manger Jesus lay, 

Hath robed herself in spotless snow. 

It seems as if some second birth 

Were nigh at hand, so still is night; 
As if the silent heart of earth 

Were but one great un uttered prayer, 
And round it wings were folded white 
Of angels brooding in the air. 

Across the valley, o'er yon hill, 

The quiet moon's cold, silvery light 
Rests on dark wold, and frozen rill, 
And shadows on the dim blue sky 



258 HYMN FOR CHRISTMAS EVE. 

The marble gravestones, still and white, 
Where someone's darlings softly lie j 

To whom our Christmas shall not come, 

Nor break the merry New -Year more; 

Their hearts are still, their lips are dumb. 

Oh, that pale Harvester did cull 

The loveliest, who have gone before : 

Death loveth most the beautiful. 

But other thought to - night than God 

Should claim not fevered minds of men : 
Time marks not now the changeless sod, 
The dying year, nor lessening hours, 
But whispers Spring shall come again, 
With sunray, bud, and early flowers. 

The sunshine of a lovelier year, 

Of purple dawns and orange eves, 
Shall fringe the fields, and the full ear — 
An earnest of a richer boon — 
Shall glow upon the ripened sheaves, 
And reapers dance beneath the moon. 



HYMN FOB CHRISTMAS EVE. 2$ty 

The stillness holds in peace the soul; 
In Rama, Rachel weeps no more; 
The Christmas bells begin to toll, 

And in the East a star doth stir, 
As when the Magi came of yore, 

With gifts of frankincense and myrrh. 

Oh hark ! I hear a psalm of praise, 

A solemn anthem sweetly sung; 
Two echoes of two voices raise 

From star to star, from shore to shore, 
And thro' the sky, o'er earth is rung, 
Hail Christ, the Saviour, evermore. 



Hail Christ, th' incarnate Son of God ! 

The fallen world is raised again ; 
He reaps the ills of sin, the rod 

That scourgeth, and for every blow 
Returneth love, and bears the pain 
Of death, that all might mercy know. 



260 HYMN FOR CHRISTMAS EV& 

O wondrous scheme ! O heart divine ! 
O mercy that out - lives the years ! 
What are such little griefs as mine, 

Or those of Ruth and Naomi, 
When Eden's sin dissolves in tears 

Of passion at Gethsemane. 



So come, and let us gather round 

And worship God, and in the breast 
Build a fair temple to the sound 
Of contrite sobs, as Israel 
Strove with the angel to be blest, 
Alone, by night, at Peniel. 

Ay come, and gather near and pray, 

With larger trust in Him above, 
And watch and wait until the day 

Of faith's fulfillment come, like her 
Who, waiting, watched and wept in love 
Before her Saviour's sepulcher. 



H YS1N FOR CHRIS TMA S E VK 2 6 i 

Oh list ! seraphic melodies ! 

Oh look ! the starry veil is riven ! 
And now, as erstwhile, down the skies, 
The white -robed angels come again, 
Proclaiming glory unto Heaven, 

And peace on earth, good will to men. 



262 CHRIS TMA S MOliN. 

CHRISTMAS MORN. 

The silent snow drifts down, 

And forms a beauteous crown 
O'er unborn infant blossoms in the spray, 

That, in the merry Spring, 

Shall wake to burgeoning, 
And blithesome beauty on their natal day. 

O mayhap, long ago, 

Beneath the drifted snow 
That now is heaping o'er the Summer's tomb, 

A lovelier landscape lay, 

Abiding that sweet day 
Should call it to the light from Winter's gloom. 

So once in yon sad sky, 

The happy stars on high, 
Sang o'er the Young Child on earth's golden morn, 

When cradled in a stall 

Was Christ the Lord of all, 
And little lower than the angels born. 



Wl TH HUMBLE HEAR TS. 263 



WITH HUMBLE HEARTS AND FERVENT 
PRAYERS. 

FRAGMENT. 

With humble hearts and fervent prayers, 

They come from gods of wood and stone, 
And from their pagan altar - stairs, 

To worship at Christ's throne. 
But strangely falls the quiet night, 

Precursor of that golden morn, 
When first observes each neophyte 

The day that Christ was born. 
With songs of praise upon their lips, 

And grateful hearts, they gather round, 
And meekly bow each dusky brow, 

The lost — so lately found. 



264 SELF-RELIANCE, 



SELF-RELIANCE. 

Oh, happy they who, in self-conscious strength, 

May take the world at flood - tide, and with breasts 

Broad - bared unto the conflict of a life, 

Gather like Winkelried the sheaf of spears 

Into their hearts, and call the conquest theirs; — 

Tho' scarified and cicatrized by strife, 

May point with pride to wounds that testify 

The struggle hath been bitter, and alone 

These badges won are trophies unto honor. 

Better to fall relying upon self, 

In whom is trust, than with propendence lean 

Upon the shoulders of a fickle world, 

That to the ebb and flow of blame and praise, 

And foam - wreaths blown about upon the crests 

Of billows roll'd to popular acclaim, 

In vile tergiversation shifts around 

To meet the latest idol of the crowd, 

And pay the passing tribute of an hour, 



SELF-RELIANCE. 265 

Who casts his hope on time, while yet the breath 

Of faint ovations and eulogiums 

Keeps pointing the uncertain weather - vane 

Of public approbation unto him 

From favorable quarters, at the next 

Wind - blown, astounded sees th' inconstant shaft . 

Veer wholly round, and finds his faith undone. 

Strive not to hold the shadows of a day, 

Nor fleeting sunshine of a noon -tide hour, 

But compass centuries in the sphere of truth, 

And pluck your laurels from the coming time. 

Strong souls and noble are those that can lay 

Their every thought, and feeling, and desire, 

As hecatombs upon the world's great altar, 

And in the ashes of the holocaust 

Find their best gains embalmed imperishably. 

But an intrinsic self-reliance breeds 

Not arrogance or fulsome egotism, 

But simple unobtrusive modesty, 

And patience to conform the will unto 

The exigencies of the hour, or time, 

Or rigid laws of stern Necessity. 



266 SELF- 11 EL I A N CE. 

True self-reliance, howsoever, is 

But an effect extrinsic of a great 

High cause within, which is a perfect trust 

In God's vast wisdom, manifest in love, 

Obedience implicit rendered to 

His mandates as delivered in His Word, 

Duty fulfilled wherever it may lie, 

And an entire submission to His will. 



TO FA THER HENR Y. 267 



TO FATHER HENRY. 

Vivit post funera virtus. 

O thou, within whose garland of life - flowers 
The pale white lily now out - blooms the rose, 
Above whose orange eve and sunset - glows 
The shadow of the night already lowers; 
Who now art very near the Stygian wave, 
And that grim ferryman, who evermore 
Waits on the darkened marge to pilot o'er 
The pilgrim souls that journey past the grave — 
Dost catch the echo of the silver note 
Of welcome, angel - tuned, as it doth float 
Across the wild, dark stream ? 

Oh, by thine inner sight 
Dost thou already catch the gleam 
Of risen stars that never set, 
Above the City of eternal light ? 
About thy feet the eager waters fret, 

And shattered wrecks lie all along the strand, 



268 TO FA TTJER HENR F. 

Where sombre ripples up the the sombre sand 
Creep, tinkling with a mournful melody. 
But thou hast bided, and thou still dost bide, 
With that pale pilot, by the sable barge 
That rocks beside the ever - sobbing marge, 
Till God shall call thee from the other side. 
Long in an outer darkness hast thou strayed; 

The years have gone, and each hath brought 
its Spring, 
And Spring hath brought its flowers, but not 

for thee, 
And thou may'st never see 
The gorgeous coloring 
Of morning, or the tender evening shade. 
Oh, Beauty in her varicolored dress, 
Hath filled the world with shapes of loveliness, 
And Summer comes from out her southern grove 
To gem the meadows with the flowers we love, 
And tint each dancing rillet with a gleam, 
As of a rainbow shattered in the stream. 
And Autumn comes, clad in her dim blue haze, 
Yellowing in her smile the bearded maize, 



TO FA THE II HES R Y. 269 

And hill and valley, fleckt with golden corn, 
Reveal the lavish treasures of her horn. 
O yes, each season is the loveliest : 
But not for thee doth Beauty bare her breast ; 
Thine eyes are shrouded, and the night is cold ; 
But ah ! dear friend, thine inner heart doth hold 
A light more precious than the light of day — 
A radiant Hope that shall endure for aye. 

The songs of birds for thee are sweet, - 

And summer airs, o'er summer seas, 
Bring to thee, tho' thou canst not see, 

The sound of heavenly symphonies, 
And when the night and morning meet, 

And Phosphor beams alone on high, 
Comes faint, and far, "good -morn" to thee, 

From angel - watchers in the sky. 
The years like snow-flakes on thy brow 

Have fall'n, and many a Winter's frost 
Hath gathered there with drifted snow, 

And all that early glow is lost 
Which mark'd the morning of thy life. 



270 TO FA TI1ER UENR Y. 

Now, in the twilight of that day, 
Deepening round thee to its close, 
Hand in hand with thy sweet wife, 
Pleasant is it to reflect, 
And note the violet and the rose 
At each mile - stone by the w r ay, 
In that distant retrospect. 

We know thou may'st not tarry with us long, 
That thou already hearest the far sound — 
Faint, like a callow cygnet's dying song — 
Of strains from Heaven's hierarchal bands, 
And golden lyres struck by angelic hands ; — 
That from the faces thou hast never seen 

Thou soon shalt pass, and be forever dumb 
To tearful greetings, and the churchyard green 
Shall swell its bosom to another mound, 

For thou art waiting till the sign shall come. 

Yes, we feel that thou long canst not linger, 

But ere thou pass over the stream, 
Accept this poor song of the singer, 



TO FA THER HENR Y. 2 7 I 

As a token of love and esteem ; 
Tho' 'tis as a nosegay of posies 

That humbly sprang up into bloom, 
As lilies, and myrtles, and roses, 

May blow on the lowliest tomb. 
But I know not if lilies, or roses, 

Or myrtles should bloom on the grave, 
Nor if sweetlier the still heart reposes 

Beneath the green turf or the wave; 
But I know that who goeth to slumber, 

Who layeth him down in God's love, 
Findeth no weight to encumber 

The soul in the regions above. 
Ay, who enters that diamonded portal 

To the realms of shadowless day, 
Shall wander 'mid valleys immortal, 

And sweeter than those of Cathay. 
And never a breath of the blight - winds 

Comes fraught with destruction and pest, 
Nor ever the dews, or the night - winds, 

Are known in the Land of the Blest. 



272 ANT1-BA VC1WS. 



ANTI- BACCHUS. 

O Bacchus, youthful god of wine, 
About thy girlish brow entwine 
A fillet, wrought of dewy vine. 

Crush rich ripe grapes upon each lip, 
And deep in bubbling vintage dip 
Thy goblet, and the neclar sip. 

For thou may'st do it, mythic thing, 
Since thou canst feel no after -sting, 
Nor all wine's fiery maddening. 

Thou relic of that darker morn, 
Why, as a creed so long out -worn, 
Laugh'st thou our noon - of- time to scorn ? 

To - day thou hast more devotees, 
That drink to death thy bitter lees, 
Than e'er thou hadst across the seas. 



ANTI-BACCHUS. 2*]$ 

Ah! many cycles there have been 

Since first men crown'd thee on the green, 

As god of every festal scene; 

And dust of buried centuries lies 
Upon the heart, and in the eyes 
Of him who sang thy eulogies. 

But thou hast grown from more to more, 
And sea to sea, and shore to shore, 
Wail back thy tyranny evermore. 

The widow's sobs above her dead, 

The orphan's wild appeal for bread, 

The night - spent watches and the dread — ■ 

The piteous clamor of the slave, 
The sullied fair, imbruted brave, 
The nameless slab, neglected grave — 

The midnight murder and the rout, 

The holocaust, the drunken shout, 

The cruel madness and the doubt — - 
M 



274 AXTLBACGHU8. 

The drunkard's curses in the air, 
The Nations shrinking in despair, 
Attest thy sovereignty everywhere. 



Arise, arise, shake off the chain, 
Dispel the darkness of the brain, 
And in God's love be men again! 

O hear ye not the sounds of ill ? 
Why will ye serve that mad god still ? 
Arise, and break his iron will ! 

Look ! look ! o'er every land and sea, 
From bondage unto liberty 
The people come to set ye free. 

Come forth, come forth, from error's night ! 
We come to lead ye to the light — 
To ripened fullness, out of blight. 



ANTI-BACCHUS. 275 

Here mothers come with snow - white hair, 

Here faithful wives in tearful prayer, 

And meek - eyed daughters, sweet and fair ; 

Here aged fathers, bent with years, 
Sons, maidens, lovers, all in tears, 
From weeping over funeral biers — 

All come, with those who love to pray, 
To hail the dawn of that new day, 
When God emancipates for aye 

His children, and the false god falls, 
And nevermore the tyrant calls 
His millions to his bacchanals: 

When crime forevermore shall cease, 
And men joy o'er their glad release, 
And all the land lie lapt in peace: 

When the fierce war - cry shall be dumb, 
And Christ's fraternal love shall come 
As law, in earth's millenium. 



276 BEULAtt. 

BEULAH. 

Who, that feels what Love is here, 
All its falsehood — all its pain — 
Would, for ev'n Elysium's sphere, 

Risk the fatal dream again. 

Lalla Rookh. 

I. 

Damp with the dews of the morn 

Glistens a wealth of dark hair; 
Barefooted, friendless, forlorn, 
And meagre and wan, but fair. 

2. 
Tattered her garments and homely, 

But surely it cannot have been, 

That such a form, tender and comely, 

Should aye have worn vestures so mean. 

3- 

O cold was the night - wind and chilly ! 

O blithe is the morning's repose! 
Frail, frail and as slight as a lily, 
Pale, pale and as sweet as a rose. 

Fallen 'mid thieves and dying; 
Strange in a stranger's land; 



BEULAH. 277 

Wounded, athirst, and lying 
Alone in a desert of sand. 

5- 

Fallen 'mid thieves and dying; 

Levites and Priests o'er the way 
Deaf to the wailing and sighing, 
Tho' praying and teaching to pray. 

. 6. 

Lost at the foot of the mountain; 

Down into the wilderness gone; 
Far, far from the brink of the fountain ; 

Lost, lost in the city alone. 

7- 
Dead — ere the hope of to - morrow ; 

Dead — ere the rise of the sun ; 

Dead — and the blight and the sorrow 

Forever and ever done. 

8. 
Hath she sinn'd ? may her sins be forgiven ! 

Hath she soilure ? no ! death maketh clean ! 
Prayer openeth the portals of Heaven ; 

Say only, A new Magdalen. 



278 THREE SONNETS ON A WINTERS EVE. 



THREE SONNETS ON A WINTER'S EVE. 

I. 

Now o'er the earth the soft dark curtain falls 
Of twilight, and behind the western steep 
Sol hath retired to his lengthened sleep, 

Within the shadow of Tithonus' halls. 

Lo ! her sleek hounds the chaste - ey'd huntress calls, 
And from her levant gates of chrysoprase, 
She swiftly starts upon the evening chase; 

While, one by one, from every mountain grove, 
To join her train, each oread appears. 
Anon, the pale-faced goddess, still in tears, 

Unto her chariot yokes each silver dove, 
And fleetly hies across the galaxy 

To weep beside the grave of her dead love, 
Till morn shall rise from out the eastern sea. 



THREE SONNETS ON A WINTER'S EVE. . 279 
II. 

Those six immortal sisters, young and fair, 

The Pleiads, who ere that ill love were seven, 
Still mourn their sister's banishment from heaven, 

Like that old King wept Berenice's hair. 

Queen Cassiopea, in her starry chair, 

Still waves the branch of palm above her head; 
And Perseus cometh with a conqueror's tread 

To free Andromeda from the desert rock. 

The shepherd Pan no longer to his flock 

Flutes in green vales, or on the mountain side, 
And Naiads lave not in the crystal tide 

Of springs their snowy limbs in hidden bowers. 
For Winter now hath torn the leaves aside, 
And underneath his feet hath crusht the flowers. 

III. 

Ay Winter, and the snows are on the hills, 

And on the meadows, and the churchyard tombs; 
And nigh the river, where the forest looms, 

The shadows lie along the icebound rills. 

About the fields the merry day - long trills 



280 - THREE SONNETS ON A WINTERS EVE. 

Of summer birds are silent, and the note 
Of the cicada on the air doth float 

No longer, and the reaper's song is done. 
But finer joys, to every heart's behoof 
And earnest sequence, have not held aloof, 

But crown the viclor when content is won. 

About each happy home a spirit flits 

With guerdon — fadeless flowers undefiled — 

And pausing, sprinkles holy balm where sits 
A mother watching by her sleeping child. 



LA VIEEGE A LA CHAISE. 25 1 



LA VIERGE A LA CHAISE. 



Around the rosy form each jealous arm 
Lies lovingly, and on the tender breast, 
In fond affection delicately prest, 

The Infant's cheek is pillow'd, white and warm. 

About them rests a felt but nameless charm; 
The Virgin - Mother and her holy Child 
Transfuse the soul with radiance, soft and mild, 

That cinctures, halo - like, each pure sweet face. 

The Boy hath an unutterable grace, 
And tho' a babe, on every feature lies 

The consciousness of Godship — that above 

He hath a throne, tho' born in lowliest place; 
And in the mystic depths of His large eyes 
Is something there to worship and to love. 



282 LA V1ERGE A LA CHAISE. 

II. 

O Maiden - Mother! And Saviour - Son ! 

O human and divine so strangely blended ! 

O blest of womankind ! O Heaven - descended 
O holiness and beauty wrought in one ! 
The ages are roll'd back, — now is begun 

Christ's ministry again upon the earth; 

And now I see Him at His humble birth, 
And now upon the cross He cries, " Tis done !" 
Immortal Master of the magic brush, 

Great spirit of sublime imaginings, 
What beauteous visions, glowing in the blush 

Of Paradise, with silent winnowings, 
Did visit thee within the midnight hush, 

In rapture borne upon invisible wings ! 



TO A SLEEPING CHILD. 283 



TO A SLEEPING CHILD. 

O little face of childhood, meek and fair; 

O lover of the silent - footed god ; 

What unknown realms thy youthful feet have trod, 
What rosy regions of delight, declare ! 
Thy vermeil lips seem an unworded prayer, 

And clustered curls a golden aureole 

About thy brow, white tablet of the soul ! 
O darling, thou know'st not that life is care, 
And frost and fever each its counterpart; 

That age shall come, like winter, chill and wan, 
And snow its sorrows on thy eager heart, 

Ere thou shalt dream the summer hours are gone. 
Then sleep on, blue - ey'd Innocence, nor start, 

Too soon shall fade those tints of glory -dawn. 



284 SONNET. 



SONNET. 

I love the quaint traditions of the past, 

The mystic fables of the long ago; 

And mouldering Abbey - walls, where ivies grow, 
And legend - haunted castles, dim and vast. 
I love to muse on ruins old and gray; 

The tomb of Cheops — Luxor and Karnak ; 

And call again the scenes and people back, 
As erst they were in that primeval day. 
'Tis joy to follow, one by one, such links 

Of handiwork as antedate our yore, 

Or ponder ever the unspoken lore 
Upon which broods the melancholy Sphinx ; — 
To turn and learn from each Time - written page, 
The world is in the hoar - frost of its age. 



THE ANGEL OF NIGHT. 285 



THE ANGEL OF NIGHT. 

With dusky pinions spread, from out the land 
Of twilight glides the Angel of the Night, 
And earthward softly plumes her silent flight, 

While gathering darkness from her wings is fann'd 

Across the eloud - world, musically and bland. 
Around her flow her garments, sprent with stars, 
As far away, toward the sunset - bars, 

She takes her noiseless flight, and from her hand 

Scatters the balm of sleep on all below. 

From off her wings she winnows silver dew 

On slumbering flowers, whose aromas go 

Far in ^Eolian wanderings, breaking through 

Melodious silence in faint ebb and flow, 
Till fair Aurora peeps from eastern blue. 



286 EIGHTEEN SEVENTY-SIX. 



1876. 



The Centenary of our land is come; 
The firfl bright hour of its golden year; 
The radiant dawn of earth's millenium 
O'er the horizon breaks ferene and clear. — 
With brow bared to the growing light, auftere 
And rigid, Freedom fits with fixed eyes, 
While ever her ftern features wax fevere, 
As in the eafl fhe fees huge fhadows rife, 
And overfpread the morning glory of our fkies. — 

The graffes at her feet are wet with blood; 
A dun war - cloud rolls off above her head, 
But by her ftill the reftlefs eagle's brood, 
And 'round her are the graves of many dead. — 
From her pale cheek its firfl warm flufh hath fled, 
And tremblingly the olive branch fhe fways, 
Or fiercely grafps her nervous fword inflead, 



EIGHTEEN SEVENTY-SIX. 287 

And fnatching from her brow the idle bays, 
She plunges furioufly into the battle's blaze. — 

There is a found of tumult in the land, 
A voice of menace from the fouthern more; 
O'er Sumter's walls Mars lifts his bloody brand, 
And in the clang and clafh of battle - roar 
The chains fall from the Have forevermore. 
Thro' North and South there rolls a mighty flood 
Of agony, by cot and palace door, 
From weeping wives that mourn their widowhood, 
And all the Spice - land flowers are wet with heroes' 
blood. 

Such are the annals of our country's pad; 
What for the future? Whose prophetic ken, 
Infallible, mail give us antepafl 
Of that which is to come? Again, again 
Shall civic hatred ftir the hearts of men 
To deeds of violence and daflardy ? 
Or fhall the leffon taught of what hath been 
Fufe every heart in new fraternity, 
And all the Nation move renew'd in unity ? 



1 %% EIGHTEEN SEVENTY-SIX. 

Ah yes! I can but think it mud be fo; 
Tho' fhadows now may be upon the iky, 
And 'round the land vague whifperings may go, 
Yet flill I think the love of liberty 
Within each loyal breaft can never die. 
No ! deathlefs Freedom ! Perifh all thy foes ! 
Thou art an angel - envoy from on high, 
Sent to plant in each heart the feed that grows, 
Till all "the wildernefs mall bloffom as the rofe." 



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